


Giving  the Devil His Due

by Telesilla



Series: The Devil You Know [2]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, BDSM, Big Bang Challenge, Bondage, Challenge:Atlantis Big Bang, Cross-Generation Relationship, F/M, Flogging, Kink, M/M, Masochism, Mirror Universe, One of My Favorites, Sadism, Spanking, Wordcount: Over 50.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-14
Updated: 2010-09-14
Packaged: 2017-10-11 19:47:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 60,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/116277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Telesilla/pseuds/Telesilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Summary: Six months after the events of <em>Make the Devil Feel Surprise</em>, Rodney's come to terms with his place on Atlantis.  However, unknown to the people of Atlantis, political tensions on Earth lead to increased scrutiny of Atlantis in general and its leaders in particular. When John learns of the State's decision to change the nature of the Expedition, he must make a decision that will affect everyone in the city.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Giving  the Devil His Due

**Author's Note:**

> [Art](http://archiveofourown.org/works/119128) by [Saldemonium](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Sal/pseuds/Sal); [Art](http://archiveofourown.org/works/120451) by [marlislash (fanarts_series)](http://archiveofourown.org/users/marlislash/pseuds/marlislash)
> 
> Please note, this is the second story in a series and you really do need to read [Make the Devil Feel Surprise](http://archiveofourown.org/works/41969) first.
> 
>  **Warnings:** This is a dark mirror universe and it's full of dark, angry, vicious and occasionally psychopath/sociopath characters. In addition to copious amounts of kinky, bdsm type sex between a sixteen year old and a forty-two year old, there's also an interrogation scene, hence the graphic violence warning.

Shortly before the alarm was supposed to go off, John woke up to the sensation of a warm wet mouth wrapped around his cock. Reaching down, he slid his fingers into Rodney's hair and pushed down with his palm. Rodney moaned and took John's dick in further, not even choking when John pressed up with his hips. He must have been at it for a while because John was already close.

"Slut," John mumbled, tightening his fingers in Rodney's hair. "Cocksucking slut...."

"Mmmmm hmmmm," Rodney hummed.

John moaned, trying to decide if he wanted to come in Rodney's mouth or fuck him. Then Rodney hummed again and swallowed around the head of John's cock and John came, his hips thrusting up almost helplessly.

"So," he said as Rodney sat up and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "What do you want?"

"What makes you think I want something?" Rodney asked. "Maybe I just felt like blowing you."

"Uh uh...."

"Well...." Rodney laughed. "I have this hard on I'd like to do something with, Sir."

"And that's all?"

"Unless you have some chocolate hidden around here somewhere."

"Kneel up," John said. He leaned forward and tugged hard at one of Rodney's nipple rings.

"Please," Rodney murmured, shivering and biting his lower lip. "Please, Sir...please."

"You really don't want anything?"

"I want a lot of things," Rodney said with a swallow. "But really, Sir, I promise. I just woke up early and thought...." He trailed off with a moan as John tugged harder.

"Go on." John glanced down at Rodney's dick. "Work it for me."

After six months as John's boy, Rodney didn't blush all the time any more, but he still looked faintly embarrassed whenever John watched him jerk off. John occasionally wondered if it was all an act. He didn't really care much, but....

"Stop," he said, reaching for Rodney's wrist. He'd just had the _best_ idea.

"Please...." Rodney moaned, but he stopped right away. "Please, Sir."

"What are your plans for the day?"

"Um...I was going to spend time in the lab and I'm scheduled for some time on the range this afternoon." Rodney gave him a curious look. "You have a mission, don't you?"

"Just a quick check in with one of our agents." John got out of bed. "Stay there."

"Oh, God," Rodney muttered when John went to the foot of the bed and rummaged through the foot locker he kept there.

"Come back after lunch, clean yourself up and put this in," John said, tossing a medium sized butt plug onto the bed in front of Rodney.

Rodney's eyes went wide. "I...do you really expect me to go to the _range_ like that?"

John gave him a look and Rodney sighed. "Yes, Sir." He picked up the plug, glared at it and then put it on his nightstand.

"C'mon," John said. He was already pulling on a pair of sweats. "Ronon'll be here in a few minutes."

Rodney's irritation didn't survive their run. It was winter on 'Lantea, which meant they ran the inside circuit, and John knew Rodney couldn't resist the sight of the bare bones of the city stretching above them as they ran across the catwalks. One of the things John liked most about Rodney--aside from an appetite for kinky sex that matched John's own--was the way Rodney loved Atlantis. There were times when it seemed he was almost as possessive of the city as John was.

If John had known that anyone else felt that way about his city, he'd have been furious. But, maybe because Rodney was his as much as Atlantis was, John didn't mind at all. In fact, Rodney's appreciation of the city reminded John of just how pleased he was that all this, including Rodney, was his.

They split up after breakfast; Rodney heading off toward his lab and John making his way to his office to read the latest military news in last night's download from Earth.

It wasn't good and he was frowning as he headed toward the conference room to meet with Elizabeth and the rest of his team.

"Let's get the mission briefing over with first," John said, once everyone had settled down. "Do we know why Elthrin wants to see us?"

Elthrin was one of their oldest contacts. A trader who specialized in small, luxury items, all he ever said about his people was that they'd all been culled by the Wraith. While John didn't exactly trust him, he had to admit that Elthrin had never betrayed them, even back when the 'Lanteans weren't the feared presence they were now.

"He said he had someone who wanted to meet us," Elizabeth said. She glanced at Teyla, who nodded. "He knows us well enough to know what kind of people we're interested in talking to."

Ever since Lorne's attempted coup, Teyla had worked more closely with Elizabeth, keeping an eye on her for John. He hated to admit it, but they still needed Elizabeth's negotiating skills as well as her PR ability. And of course, if they got rid of her, Earth would simply replace her with someone else, and John wasn't quite ready to break from Earth.

 _Not without a lot more planning, at least._

"Okay, we'll meet him. I'll take Freemantle with a second jumper as back up."

Elizabeth nodded and looked down at her tablet. "As you know, we received the weekly databurst from Earth last night." She glanced over at Jeannie and her face tightened just a little. "So I assume you also know that there's been an outbreak of terrorist activity back home."

"If you didn't want me reading the databurst before you get it," Jeannie began, "you shouldn't have backed...."

"I didn't have a choice!"

"None of this is relevant to the fact that people are strapping on bombs and blowing themselves up on the Capitol steps," John said. When Elizabeth turned her frown on him, he shrugged. "It was in the military briefing; I haven't had a chance to read anything else."

"State Security wants to send some of their more troublesome dissidents here."

John frowned. "Why aren't they just lining them up and shooting them?"

"Some of these people are a little too well connected." Before John could ask his next question, Elizabeth continued. "They don't want to have them quietly killed because they might be useful later on."

John shook his head. "I don't buy it. There are plenty of places closer to home; if they don't actually want them on Earth, there are the sites the SGC maintains in the Milky Way Galaxy."

"I agree," Elizabeth said. "We know they don't trust us. Clearly, this is their way of keeping an eye on us."

"Do you think this is this connected to Major Lorne's attempt to replace Colonel Sheppard?" Teyla asked in a carefully neutral voice.

"I doubt it," Jeannie said and John nodded.

"Back home that was considered an internal shake up; my own loyalty shouldn't be in question." He looked over at Elizabeth. "Same goes for you, unless you've done something that makes them think differently?"

"I know you don't trust me and I admit that I haven't given you any reason to do so, but believe me; I don't like this any more than you do." Elizabeth shook her head. "No, I think this is just garden variety paranoia. It's the usual dilemma they have with us. They need us here to guard the gate to Earth, but...."

She was right and John finished the sentence for her. "They don't like having us hanging around the backdoor with guns." He sighed. "We still have to decide what to do with the spies...oh, sorry, terrorists they're sending us."

"Send 'em to the mainland," Ronon said. "Let the snakes take care of them."

"I'm not sure that's a good idea," Jeannie said. "They wouldn't be sending them to us if they just wanted them dead."

"We need to come up with some work for them to do," John said. "Farming or...."

"What about the abandoned naquadah mine you found on M39-X27," Elizabeth said. She turned to Jeannie. "Didn't you say it was mostly automated?"

"Yeah. We'll need to get some engineers on it and it'll need a supervisor." She frowned and looked at John. "Are they sending you more troops to guard these guys?"

"I assume that's why I'm getting a whole platoon of Marines." He still wasn't quite sure what to make of that, but he did know that he didn't like the idea. At least not entirely.

"Care to be more specific?" Jeannie asked. "How many...."

"In this instance, forty-seven guys." John frowned. He wasn't looking forward to sorting through that many men, not to mention dealing with the platoon's officer and senior NCO. "And there might be more on the next Daedalus run."

"We have a week before they send the first prisoners and the Marines through the wormhole," Elizabeth said. "Can we get the mine operational by then?"

"Maybe," Jeannie said. "I'll need to pull people from other projects, but yeah, I think we can get it going. There's not much in the way of shelter, though."

"Well," John said with a slight smile. "We'll just have to requisition extra supplies. A lot of extra supplies." Getting sufficient material from Earth was a perpetual problem and John was all for milking this situation for as much as they could.

After the meeting, once John and his team had reached the gear room, John turned to Jeannie. "Are you going to need to supervise the team working on the mining equipment?"

"Probably for a few days." She paused and looked thoughtful. "I wonder...I think we should put Zelenka on it permanently."

"You sure about that?" Ronon asked. "Just because he can't walk without a cane doesn't mean his brain is damaged. He's dangerous."

John frowned a little, remembering Jeannie's revenge. "An eye for an eye," she'd said, and John had pulled his sidearm out and shot Zelenka in the knee. Unlike Jeannie, who'd benefited from a couple of the Ancient healing devices they'd found over the years, Zelenka had had to recover the old fashioned way. Jeannie had made a habit of dropping in and chatting with Keller during Zelenka's physical therapy.

It had been funny at the time, but thinking about it now, John wasn't so amused. Zelenka had only disliked and envied Jeannie before the coup; these days, he actively hated her and didn't bother to hide it.

"Think about it," Jeannie said. "He's so obvious about hating me; everyone knows he'll be watched like a hawk."

"That is a good point," Teyla said. "If we put Kanaan in charge of the Athosians working on the project...."

"No," Ronon said. "No one here on Atlantis knows about the two of you. Put someone else in charge of them and just put him on one of the work crews. He can spy for us."

"I like it," John said. "I take it you can stand to have him stuck there?"

"Of course," Teyla said.

"Speaking of people's boyfriends," Jeannie began and John rolled his eyes. "I want Mer to do some digging in the database for information about the mines. I hate to say it, but he's turned out to do better with it than anyone, even Elizabeth."

John shrugged. "Okay." There were, he thought sourly, disadvantages to sleeping with Jeannie's brother.

* * *

They'd chosen P39-569, one of their usual meeting sites, to meet with Elthrin. Ronon had spent some time here as a Runner and while John knew he didn't like the bare, windswept, rocky terrain that housed the gate, it was a good site with plenty of room to park a cloaked jumper.

Freemantle settled into the pilot's chair once John left it and John nodded to him. "You know the drill, Lieutenant. I'll keep my hand near the panic button, but if we look to be in trouble or you see new blips on the HUD, use your own judgment."

"Yes, sir."

"Sorry, buddy," John said to Ronon as they left the jumper.

"No big deal," Ronon said with a shrug.

They didn't have that long a wait; ten minutes after they'd arrived the gate activated and Elthrin and another man walked through. They looked to be alone, but John waited until Jeannie checked her life signs detector before he stepped forward.

As they got closer, John felt himself tense up a little. Elthrin's companion was wearing familiar looking leathers.

"This is Marrik," Elthrin said. "He's...."

"Traveler?" John asked, his hands resting on his P-90.

"Yes," Marrik said with a little bow. He looked nervous. "I'm the First Officer of the _Beltarin _. I assure you, we only had limited contact with Larrin's ship."__

"Really?"

"Believe me, Colonel Sheppard, there were plenty of us who were pleased and relieved when you took care of her and her ship."

He sounded sincere and John nodded. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Ronon and Teyla relax. Jeannie had a slight smirk on her face; she'd been far more amused after his capture than John liked.

"Really?" When Marrik nodded, John continued. "Okay, what did you want to see us about?"

"Elthrin tells me you're looking to pick up some of our guns. Like Specialist Dex carries," he added, gesturing toward Ronon's gun.

John glanced at Teyla, who stepped forward with a slight smile on her face. "You are correct, although now that we have a growing stock of Wraith weapons our need is not so urgent. " She spread her hands. "So, let us talk."

"We're having problems with the power distribution on our ship." Merrik glanced over at Jeannie, who was suddenly frowning.

John, who'd expected to be bored out of his mind while Teyla arranged a trade of fresh vegetables or medicine for a few guns, shook his head. "You want McKay to fix something? That's not something we do for just anyone; most people in this galaxy can't afford her services."

"I understand, Colonel." Merrik took a deep breath. "We can give you a case of one hundred energy pistols and the location of a derelict ship. An derelict Ancient ship."

Glad he'd left his sunglasses on, John nodded. "We might be interested." He was more than interested, but several years in Pegasus had given him even better bargaining skills than the ones he'd developed in the bazaars of the Middle East.

"I'll need to know what kind of work you're talking about here," Jeannie said. "Do you have details of the problem or have your engineers run diagnostics?"

Merrik reached slowly into the satchel he was carrying and pulled something that looked like an e-book reader. "Our Chief Engineer has put everything he knows about the problem on this."

Jeannie looked at her scanner before tucking it into her tac-vest and taking the reader. "Huh...weird notation...what are you...oh, okay."

She continued muttering to herself in the same vein for a couple of minutes and then finally looked up. "It's going to take me an hour or two to come up with a time and materials estimate."

"Perhaps we can arrange another meeting," Teyla said.

John wanted to grab Merrik and take him back to Atlantis and sweat the location of the derelict ship out of him, but while he was pretty sure they could get the information, he knew the game wasn't played that way. Teyla had worked hard to make sure that the 'Lanteans had a good reputation as tough but honest traders, and John really didn't want to mess with that.

It took another few minutes to set up a second meeting, and then Merrik nodded and headed for the gate.

"So," John said to Elthrin after the gate disengaged. "What can you tell me about him? And his ship."

"I've traded with them on and off, mostly for fresh food and occasionally, _moltro_. "

Ronon raised an eyebrow. "That stuff's kind of dangerous. How much are they using?"

"That's not the kind of information I usually share." Elthrin said and John snorted.

"Yeah, there's nothing like an ethical drug dealer," he said. _Moltro_ was a stimulant that did some pretty scary things to people's brains. Dr. Biro was experimenting with refining it into something safer, but so far they didn't use it on Atlantis. "Gimme a ballpark...um, a vague idea. I don't want to deal with these people if they're all hopped up on this stuff."

"Not that much," Elthrin said. "I think they use it in emergencies, which, since their ship is in pretty bad condition, probably happen fairly often."

"Using stimulants in the middle of an emergency?" Jeannie said, not looking up from the reader. "Imagine that."

Ronon snorted.

"Okay, so...you trust them?" John asked.

Elthrin paused, obviously thinking it over. "I think so. This is a bigger deal than I've ever made with them, so I can't say for sure."

"We understand," Teyla said. "And, should the deal go through, you will be well compensated."

* * *

"So," John said an hour later. "That's where we stand." He smiled at Teyla. "I hope I didn't look too eager. The derelict is likely a piece of junk, but you never know. And a whole case of the guns...."

"Which, for all we know, may not be working," Jeannie said. She laid the reader on the conference table and frowned at it. "This is more than just me going over with a guard and doing a few hours' work, you know."

"For what they're offering, I'm not surprised," Elizabeth said. "How much time and how many of our people will you need to help you?"

"Roughly 38...maybe as much as 45 hours of my time, and I'll need a couple of assistants."

"If it's going to take you that long, I'm going to want a look at the derelict ship," John said. "Or at least a look at her specs to see if she's worth it."

Teyla nodded. "I am sure I can get them to agree to giving us the specs, but the location of the actual ship? That I doubt."

"Specs will tell me a lot," Jeannie said.

"So, I take it you think we should pursue this?" Elizabeth looked around the table.

"I'm willing to do the work," Jeannie said. "If you send Ronon over with me, we can probably pick up a fair amount of intel as well."

"We might be able to add a bit to the pot," Ronon said. "Merrik looked kind of pale. If he's not on drugs, he might be sick."

"I'm not sure what else they can offer us," John said.

"Maybe an alliance?"

John frowned and Elizabeth sighed. "John, I know you don't like the Travelers, but they could be useful allies."

"I don't like them because they have ships and we don't."

 _And because that bitch Larrin caught me when I wasn't looking._

"It's not like we have to tell them where 'Lantea is," Elizabeth said. Leaning forward, she looked at John seriously. "I'm not saying we have to instantly jump in bed with them, but we should keep the idea in mind."

Next to Elizabeth, Teyla nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, okay," John said. "Ronon, I'll want an full military assessment."

"Sure."

"Are we done?" Jeannie asked. "Between this and the work on the mining site, I've got plenty of stuff I need to get working on."

"I'm done," John said and Elizabeth nodded.

"John," she said as he started to stand. "A moment, please?"

He sat back down but shook his head when Ronon looked at him. A moment later, he and Elizabeth were alone.

"This is what I do," she said. "I negotiated our alliance with the," she paused. "With the Genii who remained after the storm. And with the Larish as well."

"Yes, and look where that got us," John said, scowling.

"Colonel...."

And fine, maybe John wasn't being fair. Two weeks after the disastrous mission to Larish where the Larish Warleader had put her grubby hands all over Rodney, the Larish had sent her head and a very generous compensation to Atlantis. Elizabeth had used the incident to their advantage as well; it had become one more story told about how dangerous it was to go up against the 'Lanteans.

Rodney had gone off world with John twice since then, and he'd been treated with as much respect as the rest of John's team.

"If you need to send Teyla with me, that's fine."

"No," John said. "I don't want you and Teyla in the same place off world."

"Then maybe Major Jordan or Teldy?"

"I'll think about it."

"Please do."

In spite of her use of the word "please" it sounded more like an order than a request. John's mouth twisted a little as he pushed his chair back. "Did you want anything else?" he asked.

"No," she said, sighing.

John's resulting bad mood lasted through lunch. Jeannie had vanished into the lab and Teyla was busy with something, so it was just John and Ronon.

"You think I'm being too paranoid?" John asked after several moments of silence. "About the Travelers?"

"No."

"Thanks." John took another bite of his sandwich. "Damnit, Earth really needs to shake loose a fucking starship for me. Maybe McKay can fix up this ship."

"Which McKay?"

"Either one; I don't really care." He laughed shortly. "It'll sure chap Jeannie's ass if Rodney's the one who gets it up and running."

"You know how hard that would make my life?"

"You think I care?" John said dryly. But he grinned at Ronon and Ronon grinned back. "Things okay with her?"

"Yeah." Ronon raised an eyebrow. "You want details?"

"What do you think?"

Smirking just a little, Ronon turned back to his lunch.

* * *

This wasn't the first time Rodney had worn a butt plug. Sheppard liked to make him wear them while they played chess or worked on math problems, and Rodney had learned to concentrate in spite of the stimulation.

 _This is different,_ he thought as he walked carefully around their quarters, trying to get used to the pressure of the plug. After about twenty minutes, he was pretty sure he could go out into public without anyone figuring it out, partly because he'd gotten pretty damn good at hiding public erections. _It helps that all my old pants are pretty loose these days._ Still, he picked one of his longer, baggier shirts.

By the time he walked down to the range, he was walking normally, if a little slower than usual. It still felt a little strange to wear a gun at his hip; it was yet another reminder that his life simply wasn't going as he'd originally planned. Here he was, living in a war zone on an alien world in a whole different galaxy-- and the really weird thing was how much he liked it, kinky sex and all.

"Hey, Rodney," Corporal Baumgarten said as Rodney signed in.

"Hi, Amy," he replied, smiling at her. "Hey, guys," he added and waved to the room in general.

People waved back or called out his name, and that was odd too. At first, the Marines had been polite because he was Sheppard's boy, and then freaked out after the coup attempt because he'd shown that he wasn't to be fucked with. But over the last few months, most of them had come to treat him like a kid brother or a dangerous mascot. He'd been a little surprised at first, but now he actually liked it.

Shooting with a butt plug in place proved to be as complicated as he'd expected; the constant nagging arousal kept him from concentrating. Over the months, he'd learned how to drop into a mental space where everything narrowed down to the gun and the target, but today, he couldn't quite get there.

After emptying several clips, he shook his head and stepped back from the line, pulling off his ear protection as soon as he could.

"You're kind of off today." Rodney turned to see Staff Sergeant Ruiz giving him a concerned look.

"Yeah," he said. "Sorry, Sarge. Too much other stuff going on in my brain."

"Are things okay?"

Puzzled, he looked at her until he realized that she was asking about him and Sheppard, at which point he blinked and tried to come up with something to say. Did she think Sheppard was going too far and abusing him? That they were fighting? That...what?

And did she even know what a dangerous question that was? Lorne had never asked Rodney about his situation with Sheppard, but the thing that had triggered his ill-advised coup attempt had been his belief that Sheppard was a dangerous pervert. Which, Rodney had to admit, Sheppard was, but since Rodney--mostly--liked that about him, it wasn't a problem. Or really, anyone else's business.

Finally, he just had to laugh. "Everything's fine," he said and was relieved at how natural and sincere he sounded. "I've just got a tricky engineering problem bouncing around in my head."

There was some truth to that; Rodney usually had at least a couple engineering problems bouncing around in his head, along with whatever complex math questions he and Sheppard were playing with and, ever since Sheppard had allowed him to send away for books and journals, his own, self-assigned physics homework as well.

Apparently satisfied, Ruiz nodded. "Okay. Take a break and then try again."

"Sure, Sarge."

"You fucking think too much, kid," one of the other Marines said as Rodney sat down carefully on a bench and checked his clip, trying not to squirm.

"You'll be glad I do when I figure out how to make drone weapons or a ZPM."

"Yeah," a different Marine said. "Don't mess with the boy genius...he'll come up with a way to fuck you up."

There was a pause, and then someone mentioned the latest Stanley Cup game and Rodney ducked his head to hide a smug smile as the conversation moved to hockey. To his surprise at the time, Sheppard hadn't tried to hide that Rodney had played a huge part in rescuing Sheppard, Ronon and Teyla from Lorne and his guys. It made sense, in a way; Rodney assumed that Sheppard wanted everyone to know just how loyal Rodney was. That it garnered more respect for Rodney from people in the city was just a side benefit and one Sheppard probably hadn't even considered.

Rodney was back at the line shooting when Sheppard came in. In spite of the fact that he had his ear protection on, he noticed the change in the room almost immediately. Normally, he'd have stopped whatever he was doing, but today, he felt like pushing just a little and so he waited until he'd emptied his clip before turning and acknowledging Sheppard's presence.

At first, seeing the slight furrowing of Sheppard's brow, Rodney was afraid he'd misjudged the moment, but then, as Rodney pulled off his ear protection, Sheppard walked over and looked down range at Rodney's target.

"Not bad," he said and then put a hand on Rodney's shoulder and leaned in to whisper in his ear. "Under the circumstances."

Rodney smiled just a little and looked up at Sheppard through his eyelashes. "Under the circumstances, I'm doing damn good," he replied, equally quietly.

"I have plans for you, brat."

"I figured."

Sheppard moved back and folded his arms across his chest. "Well? C'mon."

Rodney signed out as quickly as he could. He could feel cheeks go hot when Baumgartner winked at him as he handed the clipboard back to her after signing out.

"What was that about?" Sheppard asked.

"Speculation about our sex life is one of the hottest gossip topics in this city," Rodney said. "She doesn't know anything, of course," he added quickly when Sheppard frowned. God, the last thing he wanted to do was get someone who didn't deserve it in trouble. "It's just...." He shrugged. "We were both obviously in a hurry. People are going to make assumptions."

They'd reached the transporter and Sheppard pulled Rodney inside but didn't hit the screen right away. "Yeah? _Are_ you in a hurry for some reason?" He tugged Rodney in closer and slid a hand down his back and under the waistband of his pants. "You little whore," he murmured, pressing against the base of the plug.

"Please, Sir," Rodney moaned, squirming as Sheppard continued to play with the plug. "God, it's been driving me crazy all afternoon."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I don't know what's hotter--running around with this up my ass, or knowing that you _wanted_ me running around with this thing up my ass."

"Flatterer," Sheppard said, but he sounded pleased.

"Just honesty," Rodney replied and then gasped as Sheppard tugged the plug out a little and pushed it back in hard. "Please...I've been ready for you all afternoon...."

"Oh no," Sheppard said, finally pulling his hand out of Rodney's pants. "You're nowhere near ready." He touched the screen and then, once they'd materialized, grabbed Rodney's upper arm and pulled him down the corridor to their rooms.

Once there, however, Sheppard didn't drag him right to bed as Rodney had expected and hoped he would. Instead, he let go of Rodney's arm and stepped back. "Strip."

Rodney obeyed quickly, not making a show of it. Once he was naked, he went down to his knees into the position Sheppard had taught him, hands behind his back and legs spread. Sheppard smiled.

"Do you have any idea what you look like?" he asked, giving Rodney a once over.

"Someone who really really wants to get fucked?" It wasn't the right answer, and Rodney knew it, but Sheppard usually liked to drag the right answer out of him; Rodney figured that that was the game they were playing now.

"That too," was all Sheppard said, heading toward the footlocker of toys.

Rodney tried not to fidget as he tried to guess what Sheppard had in mind. He'd used his belt on Rodney a couple of days ago, and Rodney had fresh bruises in the inside of his arm from just last night. When Sheppard finally turned around, he had metal in his hands, and Rodney swallowed hard, recognizing the tight, heavy nipple clamps. Sheppard smiled as he crouched down in front of Rodney, one hand already reaching toward Rodney's chest.

The clamps hurt going on; Rodney didn't bite back his whimpers as Sheppard placed them and then let the chain connected to the clamps drop. Through it all, Sheppard watched him eagerly, all his attention on Rodney's reactions. He tugged at the chain and then smiled when Rodney muttered, "ow...fuck!"

"Oh yeah," Sheppard said and then reached for the chain again. Rodney braced for another tug, but instead, Sheppard clipped something to the chain; Rodney looked down to see a teardrop metal shape he was pretty sure was a fishing weight. Whatever it was, it added to the pull on the clamps, making them hurt even more. After a brief moment spent watching Rodney's reaction, Sheppard clipped another weight to the chain.

"Fuck," Rodney said, a little more breathlessly this time. "Please...don't...it hurts."

"That's kinda the point," Sheppard said, leaning in to bite and kiss at Rodney's mouth. "Do you know what you look like?" he asked when he pulled away.

Rodney blinked, not sure if he should push it and be a smart ass, but fortunately, Sheppard didn't appear to want an answer. He stood, and for a moment Rodney was sure Sheppard was going to unzip and ask for a blowjob. Instead, he gestured toward the rarely used second bedroom.

"I want to show you something."

Rodney knew better to get to his feet, but while he was used to crawling, this was different. Each time he moved he was aware of both the clamps and the plug and he was so hard that his dick was leaving a wet patch on his lower belly.

It was a little freaky, actually. Sheppard seemed to have a boundless imagination when it came to kinky sex, and Rodney was still surprised at how he enjoyed, even _wanted_ , everything Sheppard did to him. Of course that didn't stop him from wondering, each time Sheppard did something new, if this was going to be the time that Sheppard pushed him too far.   
And, if it was, what he'd do.

Sheppard reached the smaller bedroom long before Rodney did, and now he stood and watched Rodney. "Kneel up here," he said. "Facing the wall."

Confused, Rodney did just that. _Oh he did_ not _just tell me to do the kinky equivalent of standing in the corner, did he?_

"Close your eyes."

From what Rodney was able to tell with his eyes closed, Sheppard stepped past him toward the wall. There was the brief crawling/shivery sensation he always felt under his skin when Ancient tech was being activated somewhere near, and then Sheppard stepped back to stand behind him.

"Okay, you can look now."

The wall in front of Rodney was now a full-length mirror and he stared at it, his eyes wide with shock.

He looked in mirrors about as much as any guy did, and he'd gotten used to the longer hair and the fact that he had to shave every day. But this....

Rodney had never seen himself the way Sheppard saw him--never seen what he looked like when he was...when he was like this--and now he stared, watching as his face went pink and hot.

"So, this morning," Sheppard said, and Rodney looked higher in the mirror to see Sheppard staring at Rodney's reflection intently. "I found myself wondering if that whole embarrassment thing you do is real or if it's just something you think I like seeing."

"Sir, I...."

Sheppard waved away Rodney's protest. "It's okay. I don't mind you doing something you know I like." He reached down and ran his fingers through Rodney's hair before tightening them and tugging a little. "I just wanted to see you _really_ blush."

"I...yes, Sir." There really wasn't anything to say; Sheppard was, as always, getting what he wanted out of Rodney. It was one thing to know that he liked what Sheppard did, but it was something else entirely to see himself kneeling, naked and hard, at Sheppard's feet.

"Go on," Sheppard said after a moment. "Do what you wanted to do this morning."

It took Rodney a moment to figure out what Sheppard wanted and then he almost refused. Sheppard's hand went even tighter in his hair and he crouched down to kneel behind Rodney. "Do it," he snapped and it didn't matter that Rodney really didn't want to see this, didn't want to know this about himself quite this emphatically; he'd learned not to argue when Sheppard used that tone of voice.

Trying to tell himself that he was just doing this because he didn't want a beating that would leave him so sore he had to lie on his stomach to study, Rodney reached down slowly and wrapped his hand around his dick.

It wasn't easy; each stroke made him move in a way that reminded him of the clamps or the plug or both. And, of course, he could see himself, watch as he jerked off, see his face go red. "God," he mumbled. "This is...I...."

"Yeah, that's it," Sheppard said, leaning in to speak right into his ear. "Look at yourself, slut. Whore."

Something uneasy coiled in Rodney's stomach, something deeper than simple embarrassment. He wanted to close his eyes, wanted to stop jerking off, and yet....

"Please," he whispered, not even sure what he was asking for.

"Please what?"

"Please, " Rodney tried again. "Tell me...."

"Tell you what?" Sheppard's voice was low and husky. "Tell you what you already know? That you're a slut? That you're embarrassed and ashamed and getting off on it?" His mouth was right against Rodney's ear and Rodney shivered. "I'm going to hurt you now. Keep your eyes open, watch your face, see what it does to you."

Rodney expected Sheppard to pull on the chain between the nipple clamps, but instead, he reached around, slid a hand down Rodney's arm and pinched the inside of Rodney's elbow hard. Rodney cried out but somehow managed to keep his eyes open. He looked...different than he'd expected. His mouth was open because he was panting as he tried to breathe through the pain and while it was obvious he was hurting, there was something else, something almost hungry about his expression.

"You like it," Sheppard said. He pinched Rodney again and Rodney watched himself react. "You like it," Sheppard repeated.

And when Rodney said, "yes I do...oh God, yes...please... _please_...." he wasn't just saying it because he knew Sheppard wanted to hear it.

"Please what?"

"Hurt me...fuck me...please!" Rodney had stopped jerking off and now he pressed back against Sheppard, who pinched him again. "I like it...oh fuck...ow! You...you made me like it...." He caught the look on Sheppard's face--all smug pleasure--and wriggled a little. "Please...need it, need you to fuck me like the slut I am."

"Oh God..." Suddenly Sheppard looked almost as wrecked as Rodney. He planted a hand on the middle of Rodney's back and pushed and Rodney went down onto his hands and knees and then onto his elbows as Sheppard pushed his knees further apart.

Sheppard wasn't gentle when he pulled the plug out, but by now Rodney was humming with endorphins and need and hardly noticed. "Please," he moaned, arching his back. "Please...hard, oh god, fuck me hard!"

"Whore," Sheppard growled. He spread Rodney open and shoved in hard, and it was just what Rodney wanted.

"Yours," he said, pushing back to meet Sheppard's brutal rhythm. "Your whore...."

"Come for me...go on, do it now." That was another command Rodney had gotten used to following. As Sheppard bit at his neck, above the collar, Rodney cried out and came.

"Gonna keep fucking you...make you come again."

"Please...do it hard...make it hurt...please, Sir!"

Not that Rodney really had to worry about Sheppard making it hurt; being fucked after coming always bordered on painful and it wasn't like Sheppard was going to slow down. And once Sheppard was really moving, he reached around and grabbed the chain attached to the clamps, tugging on it hard.

"You like it...."

"Yeah...oh God...I do, I really do."

By the time Rodney was getting close to coming a second time, he'd run out of words. He stared at the mirror and wasn't even sure he recognized himself; his mouth was open and...Jesus, was he crying?

"Tell me." Sheppard let go of the chain and reached down to stroke Rodney's dick roughly. "Tell me what you see."

"You," Rodney managed to say, his voice hoarse. "You fucking me...hurting me...making me cry...you...."

Pulling back, Sheppard slammed in hard. "Oh fuck...."

"Please...please, it hurts...."

"Good," Sheppard said as he sat back, pulling Rodney with him. "It's about to hurt a lot more." He waited until Rodney's back was against his chest and then reached around.

Rodney caught his breath and tried to brace for the pain as he watched Sheppard's fingers close on one of the clamps. "Don't...please...don't!" Sheppard ignored him and opened the first clamp.

It hurt like hell; Rodney arched in Sheppard's arms and yelled loudly. "Fuck," Sheppard muttered, thrusting up into Rodney a couple of times before reaching for the other clamp. "C'mon, boy...scream for me."

Rodney didn't really have a choice; this time, Sheppard just yanked the clamp off and it felt like he'd taken Rodney's whole nipple with it. Throwing his head back, Rodney screamed and felt fresh tears run down his cheeks.

"Fuck," Sheppard groaned. "Oh, fuck...bring yourself off. Now!"

Rodney's hand was shaking, but he desperately wanted to come, so he reached down and started jerking off again. He stared at the mirror and he looked so strange, so wrecked and undone, that it was almost like looking at someone else.

"That's what I see," Sheppard said. "That's what you look like...so fucking gorgeous...and all mine."

"Yours," Rodney choked out. "Yours...please...Sir, please...please let me...."

"Do it!" Sheppard bent his head and bit Rodney on the neck as Rodney gave a loud cry and came so hard he barely noticed Sheppard thrusting into him once more before he came as well, his teeth sharp on Rodney's neck.

"So," Sheppard said after a long moment of silence broken only by their harsh breathing. "It is still possible to embarrass you." He ran his thumb idly over one of Rodney's sore nipples and smiled when Rodney gasped and shivered. "Of course I should have known you'd go for humiliation."

"It was...it wasn't easy," Rodney said, biting his lip and looking away from the mirror.

"Nothing worthwhile is," Sheppard said quietly, his arms going tight around Rodney for a long moment.

When he spoke again, his voice was brisk. "C'mon, we both need a shower."

After the shower, Sheppard had Rodney radio down to the kitchen for dinner.

"So," he said, after they were seated at his desk, trays in front of them. "Some things have come up...."

All of Sheppard's news was interesting, but Rodney couldn't help thinking about the prospect of a spaceship to work on, even if it was derelict.

"Do you really think there's a chance the deal will work out?" he asked and Sheppard laughed.

"You know, I should be worried about these dissidents and rebels Earth wants to dump on us," Sheppard said, with a smile that made him look a lot younger. "But yeah, I keep thinking that however much work Jeannie has to do, it's worth it to get a spaceship."

"Think they'd give us a working one in trade for her?"

That got a laugh out of Sheppard and he shook his head. "Yeah, not so much. Which reminds me, she wants you to do some digging through the Ancient database; says you're better at it than anyone else, even Elizabeth."

Rodney kind of wished Jeannie would say that to his face, but, in spite of the fact that they'd managed to be civil to one another since the coup attempt, random praise just wasn't Jeannie's style.

"What am I looking for? I can't imagine there will be anything about the Traveler's ships in there."

"No, this is about the mining facility on M39-X27."

"Oh, well, that's no fun."

"Yeah, sorry, but that's the priority." Sheppard paused. "I'll tell you what: once we have our hands on those guns and that ship? I'll make sure you're involved somehow."

"Really? Cool!" As soon as the words left his mouth, Rodney winced. _Way to sound like you're twelve or something._ But Sheppard just laughed.

"That thing you did," Rodney said, much later as they lay in bed. "With the mirror...it's...."

"It's what?"

"This isn't how my life was supposed to work out," Rodney said, not even sure why he was telling Sheppard this. "It's still a little weird for me."

"Yeah," Sheppard said after a long pause. "I get that feeling every once in a while."

"It's not that I don't want to be here," Rodney said. "It's just...."

"Weird."

"Yeah." Rodney settled down and waited until Sheppard's breathing had steadied. "I do...want to be here, John."

Sheppard's breath missed a beat and then resumed a slow, easy rhythm and Rodney smiled to himself before settling into sleep. He hardly ever used Sheppard's first name, mostly because he didn't want to get too used to it and slip up in public, but also because there were times he wanted Sheppard-- _John_ \--to know that he was being sincere.

Whether Sheppard got it or not.... Rodney had no way of knowing.

* * *

The next morning, Rodney picked out his old, soft "I'm With Genius" t-shirt, and pulled it on carefully. It was loose, but still, every time he moved, it brushed against his nipples. Sheppard reached out to run a finger over the front of Rodney's t-shirt and then laughed when Rodney squirmed.

By the time Rodney, with Namin behind him, came into the lab, he was getting really tired of the distraction. Dr. Mullins took one look at him and held out a cup of coffee.

"Thanks," he said. "We've got some real work to do, or at least I do."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, there's an semi-automated mine on...." He frowned as he tried to remember the right gate address. "M39-X27. You know, we really need to name these places." Walking up to a half-clean white board, he scribbled _M39-X27 -- Bespin_.

"Apparently we're about to have some political prisoners dumped on us, which, by the way, isn't common knowledge yet, so officially neither of you know anything about it. But, Dr. Weir and Colonel Sheppard want to put them someplace where they can be useful. So I'm supposed to go digging through the database looking for information on it."

"Well," Mullins said. "If anyone can find anything, it'll be you."

Rodney grinned. "I'm glad someone around here has confidence in my abilities, but yeah, I hope so.."

 _At least,_ he thought as he sat down and his shirt rubbed against his chest, _he didn't beat me last night._

* * *

Two days after their first meeting, John and his team met with Elthrin and Marrik again.

"It will take Dr. McKay and two assistants roughly 45 of your hours to repair your power distribution problem," Teyla said to Marrik. "Dr. McKay will be accompanied by guards and will work for no more 10 hours a day. She and her people will not remain on your ship to sleep and they will bring their own rations."

She paused. "I apologize if this seems extreme; however, we have learned to be cautious."

"Dr. McKay's abilities are well known," Marrik said. "I understand your concerns."

John hid a smile. It was true that Jeannie's talents were known through most of the Pegasus galaxy, but, more importantly, most of the galaxy also knew the extent the 'Lanteans would go to punish anyone who tried to keep her after she'd finished the agreed upon work.

"In return, we will expect the case of weapons you promised as well as the location of the derelict ship. And we would like to see any information you have on the derelict before we conclude this bargain."

Once again Marrik handed over a reader. "I figured you'd want to see what you were getting," he said.

John smiled tightly at him as he took it. "Glad to see you anticipated us. Now, we know your power situation is pretty bad; McKay says you can't use your hyperdrive?"

"No, unfortunately."

John sighed. The timing for this could have been better. "All right," he said. "Give us a few minutes to go over this and then we'll set up a schedule."

"Well, this is a mess," Jeannie said after a few moments spent looking at the specs for the derelict ship. "Hyperdrive's fried, life support is shot, it looks like it's taken quite a few hits...."

She shook her head. "This isn't a matter of me and a couple people doing a few weeks work and then you'll have a working spaceship. This is going to take time. A lot of time."

"I expected as much," John said. "Is it worth your time?"

"Long term...probably."

"Plus the intel," Ronon said.

"Okay, let's get it over with then, okay?" John said. "We'll stick to the schedule you came up with. Teyla, tell him we can start day after tomorrow."

It was going to be complicated, not having Jeannie to ride herd on her scientists, he thought later as he flew the puddlejumper back to Atlantis. The initial work on the mining settlement had begun, although right now it was mostly Marines and Athosians building shelters. Rodney had dug up a information about the original mine in the database and was pretty confident that he could write what he called a "quick and dirty tech manual."

None of this needed Jeannie, but still, unsupervised scientists made John nervous. Dr. Simpson was good and she'd been loyal to Jeannie for years now, so John tried to relax and tell himself everything would be fine.

They returned to Atlantis mid-afternoon and after meeting with Jordan and Teldy to work out some of the logistics of having an entire platoon of new Marines descend on them in one afternoon, John made his way to Rodney's lab.

"Bespin?" he asked, looking at the whiteboard.

"What? It needed a name." Rodney looked up from his tablet and smiled a little sheepishly. "Geek culture, sorry."

"No," John said with a grin. "I like it. I saw _Star Wars_ at least ten times the first summer it was out."

"Me too," Dr. Mullins said and then ducked her head when John glanced at her.

"Even Namin's seen it," Rodney said. "We took a couple afternoons off about a month ago and watched it. Sometimes you just have days when the brain needs a rest."

"Yeah, well," John said and wanted to laugh when Rodney looked worried. "Just...you know, invite me next time."

Rodney looked surprised for a moment and then just nodded.

"How's the work on the mine going?" John asked.

"Not bad. I think it's going to be like a lot of Ancient stuff; once someone with the gene initializes it, anyone who knows what they're doing can run it." He frowned a little and lowered his voice. "Is it true that Jeannie's put Zelenka in charge of the mining operation?"

"Yeah," John replied equally quietly. "All our rotten eggs in one basket."

"I guess...." He looked down at his tablet. "I'm going to do a rushed tech manual and then give it to Jeannie, let her hand it over to Zelenka. He really doesn't like her, but he fucking _hates_ me."

"If he comes near you...."

"He hasn't and I don't think he will. He's afraid of you."

"Damn well should be."

"Like everyone else around here," Rodney said, a faint smile. John reached out and slid his fingers into Rodney's hair.

"You too?"

Rodney tilted his head a little and opened his mouth and then paused. John could almost see the moment he decided to be honest. "Sometimes, yeah." He smiled wryly. "And sometimes I like being afraid of you."

John looked away from Rodney to see both Mullins and Namin looking very carefully at their tablets. "Okay, you two, time to take a break."

They both left without saying anything and Rodney shook his head once they were gone. "You're disrupting my staff," he said with a little smirk.

"Your _staff_?"

"Well, I am the...." He paused and tilted his head. "The Special Science Advisor to the Military Commander of Atlantis."

"Try saying that five times fast," John said, chuckling just a little. "You know," he continued a little more seriously. "You really should have a couple more people."

Rodney blinked. "I was joking," he said.

"I know. But at the point when the CSO is assigning you work and you've got Namin working on the database...."

"Only because he learned to read Ancient as a kid and he'd be bored out of his mind otherwise." Rodney shook his head. "And I got lucky with Mullins; she happened to have pissed Jeannie off at just the right time. At first it was just that she felt sorry for me and she likes teaching. Now, of course, she wants to be on the winning side, which these days, pretty much means you.

"But anyway, there's no guarantee that the next person Jeannie assigns to me won't be loyal to her."

"Jeannie's a member of my team; that kind of means she's on my side."

"Not when it comes to work." Rodney raised his chin. "Let's say I finally figure out a way to make drone weapons, or even ZPMs. There's nothing to stop her from stealing my research."

Rodney was right, of course. To a certain extent, all the research done on Atlantis fell under Jeannie's purview and John knew enough about both academia and Jeannie to know that she'd be happy to exercise her rights and claim primary authorship on anything Rodney wrote.

"I understand that," he said. "And I don't blame you for worrying. But there's a way around that. From what you've said, one of your sticking points is that you don't have any experience with weapons and weapons systems."

"It slows me down," Rodney admitted. "Mullins is a really good aerospace engineer; did you know she actually worked on the Prometheus class ships? But she's never done much with weapons. And I've got a pretty good grounding in theory, but I look at some of this stuff the Ancients left behind and...." He spread his hands. "I'm learning as I go."

"I've got a couple Marines with engineering degrees and one of them, Corporal Phillips, is on limited duty. He caught a lungful of some kind of gas on P04-397 and though Keller did what she could, even with the medical tech we've found, he still isn't fit for combat. He's one of the original members of the expedition and all those guys are loyal."

"Huh...." Rodney frowned a little. "I need to be able... _he_ needs to be able to work with me."

"Fine, take him on probation."

"Can I ask...." Rodney took a deep breath. "John, he's not a spy, is he?"

John shook his head, obscurely pleased; after all, if he were in Rodney's place, he'd wonder. "No," he said. "I trust you."

Rodney smiled at that, a broad smile that made him look even younger than he was. "Okay then...." He leaned forward and kissed John. "So, Colonel. How can I possibly thank you?"

Reaching out, John took gripped a handful of Rodney's curls and tugged down. "Why don't you start on your knees and we'll go from there?"

Licking his lips, Rodney went down on his knees. Before John could even issue an order, Rodney had his pants down and was leaning forward, his mouth open. When he spoke, John felt each little exhalation as a warm puff of breath across the head of his dick.

"Hard and fast? Or do you want me to draw it out?"

He'd intended to come in, get a quick blowjob and then head back to his own office. Now, looking down as Rodney looked up at him, his blue eyes wide, John changed his mind. "Slow," he said. "Take it deep."

"Oh yeah," Rodney murmured. He licked his lips again and then leaned forward, his hands resting lightly on John's hips.

John bit back a moan and his hands went tight in Rodney's hair as Rodney's mouth closed around his cock. Rodney went down and then kept going down, sucking hard, and God, John had had incredibly expensive pros and experienced members of various military comfort detachments and none of them had ever been this good. Part of it was that Rodney had spent the last six months learning just what John liked, but there was also the fact that he clearly _loved_ sucking cock.

As if answering John's thoughts, Rodney closed his eyes--his thick lashes fluttering against his cheeks--and moaned around John's dick. He tugged just a little at John's hips and John thrust in, feeling that perfect moment when Rodney _almost_ choked before he took John's cock all the way in. "Fuck," John groaned. "Jesus fuck...."

As much as he wanted to just let go and fuck Rodney's mouth hard, he held back, letting Rodney set the pace for the most part. Rodney took him to the edge and then backed off and went sloppy--all wet heat and hot breath and tongue.

Then he did it again and again until John was gritting his teeth and trying to remember why he'd wanted it slow. He was just about to hold Rodney's head still and just shove in until he came, when Rodney pulled all the way back.

"Do you want to come in my mouth? Or all over my face?"

"Mouth," John growled. And now he did grab two handfuls of Rodney's hair, dragging him down hard. Rodney sucked _hard_ and moaned, and that was enough; John came, locking his knees to keep from falling over.

"Fuck," he gasped when he breathe again. "You give the best fucking head I've ever had."

"Wow, really?" Rodney's voice was hoarse and John almost got hard again just listening to him. "Does that mean I get to come?"

"Yeah," John said. "Get up on your feet and come here."

As Rodney got to his feet, John buttoned up his pants and then leaned against one of the lab counters. Hooking an arm around Rodney's waist, he turned him until Rodney's back was up against John's chest. He reached down and undid Rodney's baggy khakis and then licked his palm and gripped Rodney's dick hard.

"Work for it," he said. "Move your hips for me, boy."

"Oh God," Rodney moaned, shoving into John's hand. "Fuck...'m close...."

"Just from sucking me off?"

"Yeah...oh, hell yeah." Rodney leaned back closer, his head falling back against John's shoulder. He tilted his neck and John could see the bite mark from a few nights ago, just below the line of Rodney's collar. "Please," Rodney moaned. "Hurt me...bite me, please?"

 _So fucking perfect,_ John thought as he bent his head and bit down on the bruise. "Come when you want to," he mumbled around Rodney's skin and then bit even harder. Rodney cried out hoarsely and his body shuddered in John's arms as he shoved into John's fist one more time and then came.

When John brought his wet, sticky hand up to Rodney's mouth, Rodney gave a soft little moan and licked his fingers clean.

* * *

Rodney was standing on one of the balconies overlooking the gate room when the new Marines brought the first batch of prisoners through. He didn't have any real reason to be there, but then again, he didn't have any reason not to be, and these days he went wherever he liked.

"God, all these new people," he said to Namin. "It's weird; before I came here, forty five people wasn't a that big a crowd."

"It's closer to seventy people with the prisoners."

"True, but still, that's not a lot of people. There were more people than that at Jeannie's wedding."

"Dr. McKay was married?" Namin's voice was low but Rodney still looked around.

"Yeah, he died...long story. I'll tell you the whole thing some day."

The prisoners were being sent through in groups of five. A large storeroom had been converted into a temporary holding pen and Atlantis' own security--both Marines and Athosians--took each group of scared looking civilian prisoners past a Marine with a scanner and then down the hall to the storeroom. Meanwhile the new Marines were steered toward the big room Sheppard used when he wanted to address the entire military contingent.

It was all very efficient, and before more than ten minutes had passed, the last group of prisoners was coming though.

"Wow," Rodney said. "Someone down there has some bright hair...." His voice trailed off as the person with the red hair looked around; Rodney leaned in for a closer look.

The red-head was a boy, maybe Rodney's age or a year older. It was hard to tell because he was fine-boned and pretty, almost but not quite feminine. "Son of a bitch," Rodney muttered, instinctively looking around for Sheppard.

"Do you know him?" Namin asked.

"I don't need to; I know why he's here." Rodney frowned and gestured, trying to forestall any more questions.

A moment later, he saw Sheppard move forward, glancing over the lest group of prisoners. There was a pause when he saw the red haired kid and then he looked up at Rodney. Anyone who didn't know him would have thought he was disinterested, but Rodney could see the anger in his body language.

"They're idiots," he said softly, knowing Sheppard could read lips.

Sheppard nodded tightly and jerked his head at the Marine in charge of that particular group.

"Well...what are you waiting for?" he snapped, loud enough that Rodney heard him. "Get these people out of the way and where they belong; we've got supplies coming through."

"I've seen enough," Rodney said. "C'mon."

He didn't head for the lab though; he was too angry to concentrate, and so he wandered down a couple of floors and headed out to one of the rarely used balconies.

"Why was the Colonel so angry?"

So Namin had seen it too. Rodney sighed with relief and then reached into a pocket and pulled out the small scanner Sheppard had given him. He checked it, but no, no one was using a listening device or accessing the city's security system at this particular point.

"Once, when I hadn't been here that long...um, this is totally confidential, by the way."

Namin nodded. "Of course."

"Colonel Sheppard once asked me if anyone had said anything about him to me. Before I got here, I mean. He wanted to know if someone had told me how to act, if I'd been told to pretend to like certain things...."

Namin nodded. "So the red-head...you think someone sent him deliberately?"

"Yeah, and whoever did it really is an idiot. How stupid do they think the Colonel is?" Rodney frowned and looked out over the ocean.

"Rodney?" Namin said, after a pause.

"I'm fine," Rodney said, almost angrily. "I just...this is stupid. I'm _fine_."

His radio hummed. "Rodney?"

"Colonel?"

"My office. Now."

"Yes, Sir."

Rodney walked as fast as he could, letting Namin follow him. Right now the last thing he needed was Namin's sympathy, as much as it was nice to have someone who gave a damn about him. But he had to calm down; he had a feeling Sheppard was going to be angry enough for both of them.

Sheppard's door slid open, but Rodney still tapped on the door jamb. "Sir?"

"C'mon in."

Namin, his face carefully blank, took the spot outside the door opposite Sheppard's Marine guard, and Rodney stepped into the office. He was at a distinct disadvantage here; he rarely spent time in Sheppard's office, and when he was here, he was usually face down over the desk or on his knees. Now he wasn't sure what to do, and so he just stood in front of Sheppard's desk, his hands behind his back.

"Sir?"

"Oh, for fuck's sake, sit down."

Rodney settled into a chair and took a deep breath. "He's very pretty."

"Jealous?"

"Well, yeah," Rodney said. "His mouth doesn't do this thing...." He trailed off and gestured to his own mouth.

"Are you fishing for a compliment?"

"No." Rodney frowned.

It wasn't the right thing to do; Sheppard scowled back and Rodney hid a sigh. This was familiar; Sheppard would get pissed off and then he'd need an outlet and so he'd push it all on Rodney. It was all he could do to not rub the bridge of his nose where there was just the faintest bump from the break.

"If I want to fuck him," Sheppard said, watching Rodney closely, "I will."

"You think I don't know that?" Rodney said, wondering if he sounded as surprised as he felt. "I couldn't care less about that. I know that you're smart enough not to trust him, which is all that really matters."

"You're lying," Sheppard said, but he sounded a little less angry.

"No, not lying. More trying to convince myself." Rodney sighed. "What am I supposed to say? Of course I'd rather you fuck me than anyone else, but I'm not stupid. We're not...you're not like that." He spread his hands in a helpless gesture. "Do I like the idea of competing for your attention with some pretty little boy from Earth? Of course not; I'd much rather push him off a fucking balcony or shoot him.

"But it's not up to me."

Sheppard leaned back in his chair and looked at Rodney for a long moment before laughing. It was his real laugh, the one that sounded kind of ridiculous.

"I'd pay good money to see you do that; in fact, if we have to get rid of him, I'll let you do it." Still smiling, Sheppard crooked a finger at Rodney. "You better have your lube handy."

"Always, Sir," Rodney said. As he dug in his pocket, he had a sudden thought. Putting the lube on the desk, he went to his knees and unbuckled his belt, glancing up at Sheppard.

"Please?" he said, already thinking about how the belt would feel on his ass. "Please?"

"Oh?" Sheppard raised an eyebrow. "What brings this on?"

"Stress release?" Rodney bit his lip and ducked his head. "Um," he added. "For both of us?"

There was a silence and Rodney was afraid he'd pushed it, but when he glanced up at Sheppard, Sheppard looked surprised. "Really? It does that for you too?"

Rodney nodded and pulled his belt off. "Please?"

As Sheppard held out his hand, Rodney finally relaxed just a little. This he could handle, this he could deal with. And, he thought as he dropped to his hands and knees and put the belt in his mouth, it wasn't as if he'd lied to Sheppard; somewhere along the line, he'd discovered that pain actually served to relax him. It was weird, but since it also made him sharper mentally, he didn't care.

Sheppard took the belt from him and Rodney relaxed just a little more. For now, at least, everything was fine.

* * *

The morning after the prisoners arrived, John had just sat down with Teldy and Jordan to start going over the new platoon's records when Rodney showed up at his office door. John felt a sudden wave of irritation--was Rodney checking up on him?

It vanished when Rodney set a tablet down on the desk in front of John and said, "Colonel, I did some refining of the security system in the big holding cells." He brought up a map on the tablet. "It's a different system than the regular cells; I'm not sure what the Ancients used them for, although the records seem to indicate that there were occasional periods of unrest here in the city."

It was on the tip of John's tongue to call Rodney a good boy, but he bit the words back. "Good work, Rodney," he said instead. "Thanks."

"No problem, Colonel." Rodney nodded to Jordan and Teldy as he left. "Majors."

"Well," John said when the door closed. "This will help a lot. Let's set the prisoners up and then start in on the new guys."

"Sir," Teldy said. "I was about to tell you--I knew Sergeant Sanders back at the SGC. He's pretty solid; I never heard of him playing the political game."

"That's something," John said. "Do you trust him?"

She paused. "I don't know him well enough to say. He's a good Marine, but if someone convinced him that you're not loyal, he might do what he would thought was the right thing."

"That's something." John glanced at his computer screen. "Do either of you know Lieutenant Morgenstern?"

They both shook their heads and John wasn't surprised; the Lieutenant was pretty wet behind the ears. John was willing to bet that a month ago, he'd never even heard of the SGC. "I'm just wondering if he pissed someone off to get this assignment or if he's here on behalf of whoever sent Lorne."

He'd been sent a case of Booker's, which just happened to be his favorite bourbon, in the first supply run after Lorne's coup attempt. Along with it had been a note: _Sheppard, wasn't me. O'Neill._

Caldwell had told them that the _Apollo_ had a new commander, but that was the only information John had about a possible shakeup in the SGC and he had no way of knowing if Colonel Ellis had been involved in what had happened on Atlantis or if Colonel Carter had just decided she wanted his ship. He didn't know a lot about the SGC's politics, but he did know that whatever Carter wanted, Carter got.

"Goddamnit," he said with a frown. "If they aren't going to help us fight this fucking war, I wish to hell they'd just leave us alone."

"I hear you, Sir," Jordan said.

"Okay, I'm going to meet with Morgenstern. Teldy, you catch up with Sanders; see if you can get anything from him and then I want you to start testing the squads to see who has the gene. Jordan, I want an inventory count on the new gear as soon as possible."

"I've already got Linder on that, Sir," Jordan said.

"Fine. Keep me posted through the day."

The rest of the day followed along those same lines, nothing but boring administrivia; meeting with people, dealing with the inevitable paperwork caused by having this many people dumped on him suddenly.

He was blunt with Morgenstern, a stocky young man, fresh out of college and officer training and clearly overwhelmed by the situation he now found himself in.

"About six months ago, with the blessing of someone back on Earth, my XO tried to kill me and take over. He died after a week of questioning--I'll make sure you get a copy of the video."

Morgenstern nodded but didn't look surprised.

Smiling tightly, John continued. "Yeah, I figured someone would have told you. The point is, there's no way I'm going to allow your platoon to remain together. I'm sorry, but that's just the way it is."

"I understand, Sir."

"Do you?" Before Morgenstern could protest, John continued. "I'm not going to question your loyalty or that of your men, but I'm not going to count on it either. You and the rest of them are going to have to earn my trust."

"Yes, Sir."

Later, after he'd given the new guys the standard "welcome to Atlantis, don't fuck with the following people" talk and had lunch, John settled down in his office and started going through the prisoner's files.

 _Alexander Tavish,_ he read, looking at the picture with the file. Alexander had long red hair that fell past his shoulders, big green eyes and a spray of freckles across his cheeks, and in the picture, he looked startled and confused.

Of course, he was the one surviving member of his resistance cell, and John wasn't surprised to discover that there weren't any other prisoners from the British Isles in this particular batch of dissidents.

 _I know you're smart enough not to trust him,_ Rodney had said. And while he was right, what really annoyed John was that someone back on Earth thought he _was_ stupid enough to trust this kid, or at least to fuck him.

Of course, he'd had no reason to trust Rodney; he'd taken him into his bed just because Rodney was exactly the kind of boy John had never really allowed himself to have back on Earth. Really, when you looked at it that way, it wasn't that much of a stretch to assume he'd want another fair skinned, slightly frail kid who looked like he was thirteen, at the most.

And John had to admit, he was tempted. The boy was even prettier than Rodney and he looked innocent and untouched; John was getting hard just thinking of bruising him.

 _Just a peek,_ he told himself, bringing up the security cameras in the holding cell.

The big cells were much like the smaller ones. There were plenty of benches, and somewhere along the line, someone had found a stack of thin mattresses. The prisoners were either sitting on the benches or the mattresses. John knew they'd been fed around lunch time, and there was a case of plastic water bottles sitting in a corner.

 _All the comforts of home,_ he thought as he scanned the first cell and then the second. Alexander was in the second, sitting on a mattress with his arms around his knees, which were pressed up against his chest. He was wearing a plain black t-shirt and a pair of faded jeans and John frowned when he saw that someone had already gotten to the kid; there were dark bruises all over what John could see of his upper arms. _Put there,_ John thought, _to make it look like he resisted arrest. Or to intrigue me._

Someone said something to Alexander and he moved, wincing as the movement obviously caused him some pain. He looked down at his arm with an expression of distaste, and John couldn't help remembering the glimpse he'd had of Rodney once in the infirmary, the way he'd smiled as he pressed a finger over one of the bruises John had left on him the night before.

Shaking his head, John turned the cell monitor off. He really didn't have the time or energy to deal with someone who was so obviously a plant, and anyway, he had someone who knew exactly what he liked to the point of being able to anticipate his wishes.

He brought up the platoon's personnel reports and settled in to do some work.

* * *

The next few days were more of the same. Ronon, Jeannie and Freemantle checked in on a regular basis, and, as expected, Jeannie was utterly disgusted with what passed for maintenance on a Traveler ship.

"You're not there to fix the whole ship, McKay," John said one afternoon. "Leave them wanting more help."

"Yeah, yeah, I know," she said, still frowning. "But still, it offends my sense of order."

"Be strong."

She flipped him off and then moved aside to make room for Ronon.

"These guys aren't much of a threat," Ronon said. "It's all they can do to keep their ship running and from what we've seen, their weapons systems are a joke."

"How would they be as ground troops?"

"Fucking awful. Most of them never leave their ships." He shook his head. "And I was right; they're not very healthy."

"Huh...not sure if there's any point allying with them."

"Maybe, maybe not." Ronon shook his head. "There's a lot of fairly cheap help we could give them; they might not be a bad investment."

"There is that. We'll talk it over later. They treating you guys okay?"

"Yeah, we're good."

"Okay, talk to you tomorrow, then."

The work on the mining equipment on Bespin--the name had been universally adopted, to John's amusement--was moving along as well. Using the specs Rodney had dug up out of the Ancient database, Zelenka had been able to power the equipment with a couple of naquadah generators and had made a lot of progress bringing the mine online.

John wasn't wild about Zelenka having access to that much power, and he breathed a lot easier once they were ready to move a contingent of Athosians and other Pegasus refugees to Bespin. While they'd be working in the mines along with the prisoners, they'd have the easier jobs and would be getting paid.

"I will keep a close eye on Zelenka," Kanaan told John, as they stood in the gateroom late one night. He glanced at Teyla and smiled a little. "You have no idea how much trouble I will be in if something happens."

"Oh, I think I do," John said. As with all of Teyla's relationships, he knew damn well who wore the pants in this one. "Look, I'll make sure that you get some time off, both of you."

"I will hold you to that," Teyla said. "In fact...."

"Yeah?"

She and Kanaan exchanged a look. "Later," she said and John wasn't even sure who she was talking to.

"Um...okay," he said and then turned aside to give them a private moment. Not very many people on Atlantis knew about Teyla's involvement with Kanaan, and, fortunately, she was not a very demonstrative person. The traditional forehead touch she exchanged with Kanaan wasn't any different than the goodbyes between her and Jeannie when Jeannie left for the _Beltarin _.__

"What was that 'later' thing?" John asked after Kanaan had stepped through the gate. "Anything I need to know about?"

"I will gladly share the details of my relationship with Kanaan with you if you wish, John."

"Uh...no, that's okay." John glanced at her and then looked away. "You want to go grab a snack?"

"That sounds like a good idea." And okay, she was probably laughing at him, but Teyla was one of the few friends he had; as long as she didn't laugh out loud, he didn't mind.

Ronon, Jeannie, her engineers, guards and the crews of the two puddlejumpers they'd been bunking in returned the next morning. "I need a shower and 24 hours _alone_ ," Jeannie said, yawning.

"Soon," John said and she rolled her eyes.

"Here," she said, tossing something at him--one of the readers the Travelers used. "Coordinates, specs and, as a bonus, I even got some video." She rolled her eyes and looked over at Elizabeth as John grabbed at the reader. "Can the meeting wait until tomorrow morning? After I've had a couple showers, some decent food and some sleep?"

"Of course." Elizabeth smiled. "That will give you some alone time with the reader, Colonel."

"Thank you," John said as sarcastically as he could manage. Was he really that obvious?

"Colonel?" Ronon said, as everyone else left the jumper bay.

"Right." John tucked the reader in his pocket and headed with Ronon to the back of one of the jumpers. There were two plastic cases, one somewhat larger than the other.

"Twenty-six fully charged," Ronon said, pointing to the smaller case. "And seventy-four that either aren't charged or are non-functioning for other reasons."

Nodding--it was exactly what they'd been told they were getting--John opened the smaller case. "Okay," he said. "We're going to say they gave us a very few working models. I'll take one and, of course, Jeannie and Teyla will each get one. And...." He paused and then pulled yet another gun out of the case before opening the second case and taking a pistol from it as well.

"I think Rodney should have one of each."

"Yeah, I was going to suggest you give him one." Ronon said. "What about the rest of them?"

Pausing, John headed over to the door and the security panel next to it. A few touches to the controls and he'd turned off the jumper bay's security feed. "No one knows about this, but I've been meaning to tell you...."

He headed toward a section of the wall that looked like any other wall panel and touched a decorative design that was just a little different than all the others. The wall panel slid open to reveal a smallish storage closet.

"I found this back during our first week here. Memorize that pattern; it'll work even though the gene therapy didn't take with you."

Ronon took a good hard look at the pattern John had touched and then glanced into the closet, taking in the stock of weapons and the packs--a regular back pack and a larger duffel. "Why don't you have this stuff on a jumper?"

"Who says I don't?" John grinned tightly. "But I've only stocked a couple and I can't count on them being available."

"Makes sense."

"Yeah, I think the thing with Lorne proved that it's not paranoia if people really are out to get you."

There was room in the closet for both crates of guns, and once they'd stowed them, John reached into the duffle bag and pulled out a tablet. Connecting it to the door panel inside the closet, he keyed in a couple commands and grinned up at Ronon. "Okay, I've keyed it for you," he said, stowing the tablet again.

The door slid closed as John stepped back and he gestured toward the pattern on the wall. "Okay, it's short, short, long, short, short."

Ronon tested it and the door opened. He let it close again and then looked at John. "Thanks," he said, bowing his head a little.

John reached out and gripped his shoulder and then headed toward the panel by the bay doors. After turning the security cameras back on he reached into his pocket and held up the reader.

"And now? I've got some porn to watch."

The door to his quarters had just closed behind John when they opened again. "I heard that Jeannie was back," Rodney said. "Is that the information on the ship?"

He looked as eager as John felt and John couldn't help smiling at him. "Yeah. I was about to look it over."

Rodney pulled his shirt off on the way over to the desk and then kicked off his shoes. By the time John had figured out how to hook the reader up to the big computer screen they used for games and movies, Rodney had stripped down to this boxers and pulled a bottle of water out of the mini-fridge. "You want a beer?"

"Nah, I think this calls for some of the general's bourbon."

Rodney made a face, but reached for a glass and poured a couple of fingers of the Booker's. "Better you than me," he said, settling down next to John and handing him the glass.

The Travelers called the ship the _Y Riltar_ and Jeannie had been right; it was a wreck. "Jesus," Rodney said, "who the hell hit them?"

"Either the Replicators or another Traveler ship; that's not a Wraith weapon." Freemantle had done a pretty thorough flyby, but it was almost more frustrating than not having anything.

Still, they watched it twice, pausing in several places during their second viewing. "Can we even fly it here?" Rodney asked, as John tried to enhance the view of the engines.

"I doubt it." John scowled. "I hate to ask Caldwell for a tow...."

"Do Traveler ships have tractor beams?"

"Depends on the ship," John said. "But I really don't want them to tow it here...."

"Well, no," Rodney said. "Somewhere with a space gate we can control?" He frowned. "Can you bring up the specs?"

"I'm sure you can do it faster." John handed over the reader and Rodney fiddled with it for a moment and then stared at a set of what looked like engine specifications. "If it's okay with you, I'll have Mullins look this over. See if we can at least land it. Maybe somewhere like...." He frowned. "The Gamma site has a space gate, right? It'll be a lot easier for us to work on if we don't have to suit up."

"Us?" John asked, hiding a smile.

"Well, Jeannie's sure as hell not going to want to work on it; this is all grunt work and apparently she was bitching plenty about having to work on the _Beltarin _."__

"Really?" John hadn't known that, but he wasn't surprised.

"Yeah."

Rodney put his bottle down and dipped his head, looking up at John through his eyelashes. "How can I possibly convince you to let me work on the ship, Colonel?"

"Little whore," John said.

"Would you like that?" Rodney asked and John blinked.

"Like to treat me like a whore? Like some boy you picked up to use for an evening?" He gave John a hard, slightly bored look.

"So, Mister, what _do_ you like?"

"Get naked and get on the bed," John said, standing up. Oh yeah, he could play this game. As he headed toward his dresser, he added, "and you better be ready for me."

By the time he had what he wanted and turned back to the bed, Rodney had two fingers up his ass. He still looked a little bored and distant and John could easily see him as some street kid, selling himself because he had nowhere else to go. Given what had happened to his parents, he might have actually ended up on the streets if the SGC hadn't grabbed him.

Grabbing Rodney's arm, he pushed him over onto his stomach and slapped his ass a couple times. "Bruises are extra," Rodney said flatly.

"Fine," John said. He undid his pants, shoving them and his shorts out of the way before, putting his hand on Rodney's ass and spreading him open. Usually he liked opening Rodney up slowly, liked getting him to the point where he squirmed and moaned and begged, but now he just lined his dick up and pushed in hard.

Rodney brought his arm up onto the pillow and muffled a grunt with his forearm.

"C'mon, I'm paying good money for this," John said. "Put your back into it."

Almost immediately, Rodney began to move with him, matching his rhythm. He was gasping softly, still trying to silence himself against his arm, and John grinned; even when Rodney tried to pretend otherwise, he loved getting fucked. And while John would normally hold back until Rodney gave it up and came for him, this time he decided that if Rodney wanted to be treated like a whore, John would oblige.

He waited, fucking Rodney strong and steady until they were both breathing hard. Rodney was whimpering into his arm and was probably about to forget the game when John pulled out. Planting a hand between Rodney's shoulders, John growled, "stay there," and then grabbed his own dick, stroking it roughly while he looked down at Rodney's smooth back and shoulders.

"Fucking...whore," he gasped, and came all over Rodney's back. Without saying anything more, he got off the bed, pulled his pants off and fished his wallet out of his back pocket. It was strange, pulling it out; when he'd grabbed it out of his dresser he hadn't even checked to see how much money he had in it. He always had some, just in case he had to go back to Earth suddenly, and now he took it all out and tossed it on Rodney's back.

Rodney glared at him and then reached back to collect the now sticky bills. "Three hundred dollars? I'm flattered," he said and then shook his head. "Still, I'm not sure it's enough. Maybe you'll let me work on your spaceship to make up the rest of it, Mister?"

John couldn't help it; he laughed. Rodney's face immediately lost the disgruntled look, and he put the money on his nightstand and then grabbed one of the hand towels he kept under his side of the bed.

"Roll over," John said, after Rodney had cleaned up his back and ass. He wasn't surprised to see that Rodney was still hard. "You liked that, didn't you?"

"I liked you fucking me," Rodney said, rather matter-of-factly for someone with an erection. "And you coming on me. The money didn't do anything for me one way or the other, and I really didn't like pretending to be indifferent."

John sat down on the bed next to him. "I wasn't too wild about that part either...." He ran a finger along Rodney's dick. "Do something about this," he said, and before he'd even finished talking, Rodney had reached down and was jerking off.

"I was looking at your back," John said, reaching out and toying with one of Rodney's nipple rings. "It's completely without marks right now...I need to do something about that."

"Yeah?" Rodney looked up at him. "You once said you could make me like a discipline flogging..." he added breathlessly.

"You want me to use Ruiz's cat on you?"

Rodney shivered. "If you...I don't know...God, John...I wasn't like this before...didn't want pain this much...."

"Yeah?" John twisted the ring and then leaned in close. "You were made for it, boy," he said, his voice harsh so Rodney wouldn't guess how much he liked hearing Rodney use his name. "I just got to you first."

"Only you...oh fuck, please...please?"

"Do it," John said with another hard twist. "Go on...."

Moaning, Rodney closed his eyes and came. "God," he muttered as he sagged back against the pillow. "Fuck...."

"Yeah," John said. He turned and looked at the screen where the image of the _Y Rilitar_ still showed. "Hey, Rodney?"

"Sir?" Rodney was mopping off his stomach and chest, but he paused and looked up at John.

"Two things. One, we need to find out if we can land that thing somewhere. Two, we'll need to make some time in your schedule for you to work on it."

Rodney smiled at him broadly.

"Oh, and three? We need to come up with a better name for it."

"No Greek mythology. That's Earth's thing," Rodney said. "But I'm not sure about naming it something like _Enterprise_ or _Millennium Falcon._ " He got up and headed into the bathroom; John could hear him washing up.

"Oh?" he called out. "I figured you'd want to use one of them."

"Too obvious," Rodney called back. "And besides, it's one thing to take planet names, but a ship name...."

"Should be something different."

"Yeah," Rodney said, coming back into the room. He paused to take one of his tablets off the desk and then settled down on the sofa and reached for the reader. "Do you mind if I download the specs?"

"Go right ahead." John settled on the couch next to Rodney. "Something different...."

"Yeah. Of course, I haven't a clue, since I don't think we want to name it after any of my scientific heroes."

Leaning back, John closed his eyes, thinking. "How about the _Endeavour_?" he finally said.

"After Cook's ship? Or the one in _Rendezvous with Rama_?"

"I was thinking of Cook's ship. It was either than or the _Golden Hind_ and really, that just lends itself to all kinds of bad jokes."

Rodney snorted. "Yeah, no kidding. You want to go with an explorer's ship instead of...I dunno, naming it after a pilot?"

"Yes," John said.

"Okay, cool," Rodney said, and played around with his tablet a little. "There, I've renamed it on the specs." He paused. "You know that unless you throw a lot of resources and more engineers than we have to spare at this, it'll be years before it flies again?"

"Yeah; we'll be more likely to end up with an actual _Prometheus_ class ship first."   
John shrugged. "We'll just put the _Endeavour_ up on blocks in the front yard."

"Yeah, and drink your classy bourbon out of Mason jars," Rodney said, rolling his eyes. John reached over and smacked the back of his head and Rodney laughed.

"Oh hey," he asked, putting the tablet aside. "Did they give us the energy pistols too?"

"Yeah," John said. "But don't mention it to anyone outside of your lab. I'm going to say we   
got a few working ones and a few non-working ones and leave it at that." Rodney opened his mouth and before he could say anything, John pointed at his desk.

"I picked one of each for you. Don't carry the working one here on Atlantis unless circumstances call for it."

Rodney nodded as he got up and John had to hide a smile; while Rodney was careful as he put the working pistol in his nightstand with his Glock, he looked a lot more interested in the broken gun.

"Is it just not charged?"

"We don't even know if they charge or not," John said. "Ronon's has never run out of energy and he's had it for...six, seven years."

"Maybe some kind of crystal?" Rodney frowned as he looked at the pistol. "I may need break a few of these to figure out how to get them open and put them back together. There's a seam but no...."

As he turned the pistol over in his hands, his stomach growled. "I am so damn tired of being hungry all the fucking time." He put the gun down with a scowl. "Do you know how much time I waste because of this stupid hypoglycemia?"

"It's meatloaf night," John said and then laughed when Rodney perked up. "C'mon kid, let's go grab dinner."

* * *

Things calmed down for a little while once Jeannie was back and Zelenka was gone. Apparently Jeannie had come in, yelled at everyone and then settled down to work on a couple of projects she had going.

"She's hard to work around," Mullins said, "but most everyone would rather have her in the labs than Zelenka. And really, Simpson...." She made a dismissive gesture. "She's second-rate at best."

"If Zelenka ever gives you any trouble," Rodney said, "let me know. Of course with him stuck on Bespin...." He shrugged and she smiled back a little smugly.

"Anyway," he began. He was interrupted by the lab door opening. Expecting Sheppard, he was a little taken aback when a big blond Marine came into the lab, looking more than a little nervous.

"Yes?" Rodney said, frowning.

"Um...Colonel Sheppard told me to come down here. I'm Corporal Phillips."

"Oh, right," Rodney said, still a little taken aback. "Well, come in then," he added, waving Phillips in. "The Colonel told me you have a degree in engineering?"

"Yes, sir. From UCLA."

Rodney stared at Phillips for a second and then laughed. "Okay, no. The Colonel is 'sir'; I'm just Rodney." Phillips looked a little skeptical but nodded and Rodney made the rest of the introductions.

"So...." Rodney paused and then shrugged a little. "Okay, first things first. I don't know what the Colonel told you, but what we do in here, the stuff we study, isn't shared with Sciences. Or anyone else. And I mean it; not the other guys in your squad or anyone in the comfort detachment."

"I understand," Phillips said, and Rodney could almost hear him biting back the word "sir".

"I hope so, because it's not me you'll have to deal with if there's a security breach." Phillips looked even more nervous and Rodney decided he'd made his point. "Okay, so...we're working on two major projects at the moment."

He held up one of the energy pistols. "We have a small supply of these, most of which don't work. We're trying to reverse engineer them to at least figure out the power source if not how to actually manufacture them."

"That would be handy."

"To say the least," Rodney said. "That isn't the really secret project, though. People are going to see the new weapons here and there because we got some working ones as well. But this...." He tapped a couple of keys on one of the lab's five computers and the schematics of the _Endeavour_ came up on the screen.

"This is the _Endeavour_ ; it's a Traveler ship that's been given to us in exchange for the repairs we did on another one of their ships. There are less than twenty people on Atlantis who know about it, and for various reasons, we're the ones who get to play with it. Right now, we're analyzing what little data we have."

He smiled tightly at Phillips. "So, pull up a chair and start looking over these specs and do a write up on the weapons systems."

"Yes...sure."

Rodney turned back to the energy pistol, biting back another laugh.

"So," Rodney said later, as he and Sheppard walked back to their quarters after dinner. "Phillips came by this afternoon."

"What did you think?"

"I had to work hard not to laugh. I mean, he seems to know his stuff and he was all but drooling over the _Endeavour_ , but he keeps wanting to call me 'sir.'"

Sheppard seemed more amused than anything. "You don't want someone calling you 'sir'?"

"Good God, no." Rodney shook his head. "That's you."

"Damn right." Sheppard reached out and grabbed Rodney's arm, pulling him the last few yards to their rooms. "I was thinking," he continued as the door slid open and he dragged Rodney inside. "We've been so busy, but now we have a little time...."

Rodney's heart suddenly pounded in his chest. "Are you going to...." he began.

Sheppard interrupted him. "Don't strip all the way, just take your shirt off. Oh, and your shoes and socks," he said, heading toward the closet.

"Yes, Sir."

The cuffs Sheppard brought over once Rodney had his shirt off were new; they looked different than anything Sheppard had used on him before and Rodney swallowed hard. "Suspension cuffs," Sheppard said.

"Suspension...?" Rodney looked around the room a little nervously, but Sheppard just laughed.

"You're going to love this."

He was, Rodney reflected, probably right. Rodney liked bondage and he liked pain and, really, he liked almost everything Sheppard had ever done to him. So he held his hands out and shivered just a little as the cuffs were locked around his wrists. They were black and each had a small bar he could grip; it was weird, but he found himself wishing that they were dark red like the rest of the leather Sheppard used on him.

"See?" Sheppard said, reaching down to press his hand against Rodney's erection. "Told you you'd love it. You're such a whore."

Rodney licked his lips and glanced up at Sheppard. "Your whore," he said, giving the correct answer. It worked, as usual. Sheppard bent down to kiss him hard, biting and sucking at his lower lip until Rodney squirmed up against him, the fabric of Sheppard's uniform rough against his bare skin.

"Mine," Sheppard said, pulling back to look at Rodney. He reached out and pinched Rodney's lower lip hard and Rodney moaned as the pain washed over him.

"Please," he said and Sheppard laughed a little.

"You don't even know what you're asking for," he said, grabbing one of Rodney's wrists and pulling him toward the middle of the room. Reaching up, he grabbed a chain that hung down from the ceiling; Rodney had never seen it before. "Don't worry," Sheppard said. "It's strong enough to hold someone much heavier than you."

A little startled by the sharp jolt of jealousy that hit him in the stomach, Rodney just nodded. He hated the thought that other people had been here, had had Sheppard's attention the way that Rodney did now. Even worse was the idea that someone--Alexander Tavish, for example--might be here after Rodney or even some day soon, while Rodney was in the lab or somewhere else.

If Sheppard guessed what Rodney was thinking, he said nothing, although, just before he clipped Rodney's cuffed wrists to the chain, he smirked just a little.

 _Yet another thing I shouldn't find so hot,_ Rodney thought, tugging at the cuffs.

"They'll hold," Sheppard said and then reached into his pocket.

"What...?" Rodney began, trailing off as the chain moved, pulling his wrists up until they were well above his head.

"You look so startled," Sheppard said, tossing what was presumably the remote that controlled the chain onto his desk. He reached and tugged on one of Rodney's nipple rings. "Just be glad I'm letting you keep your feet flat on the floor."

"Oh, believe me," Rodney said, a little breathlessly as he turned, trying to keep Sheppard in view. "I am."

Sheppard patted him on the cheek and then walked around behind him, running a hand down Rodney's back. "So smooth," he murmured. "So pale."

"Oh, fuck...Sir, are you...?" Somehow, now that he was fucking chained to the _ceiling_ , his earlier bravado seemed a little misplaced.

"Clever boy," Sheppard said, stepping away from Rodney for a moment.

When he returned, Rodney felt something rough brushing over his back. "Did you know that there are only three companies that have contracts to make these?" Sheppard said as Rodney shivered. "The military has strict standards; there's only one type of hemp that can be used and it's got to be turned into rope and then braided in a very particular way. It's all done by hand."

"Really?" Rodney tried to sound sarcastic, but even to himself he sounded more nervous than anything.

"Really." Sheppard leaned in close and reached over Rodney's shoulder, now dragging the coarse rope over Rodney's chest and stomach. "One of the first things you learn in officer's training is how to use one." He paused to nip at Rodney's shoulder. "I really liked those lessons."

 _Yeah, I'll just bet you did._ It was kind of hot, actually, thinking about Sheppard, twenty years younger, showing a natural talent for delivering discipline. Rodney squirmed and pressed back, feeling Sheppard's hard on through his BDUs.

"Please," he finally said, because okay, _fine_ , he was turned on and he _wanted_ this.

"Of course, you don't usually get someone asking for it. If that's what you want?"

"You know it is...please?" Rodney turned his head and looked up at Sheppard. "Please?"

Sheppard stepped back, dragging the tails of the cat over Rodney's shoulder and then down his back. "Since you asked so nicely...."

With his hands bound above his head, there wasn't much Rodney could do to brace for it. Taking a deep breath, he locked his knees and waited.

"Let's start with ten," Sheppard said, his voice going husky. Rodney could easily imagine Sheppard staring intently at his back; if there was one thing six months with Sheppard had taught him, it was how much Sheppard needed this.

For all that Rodney had been expecting it, the first blow still startled him. The whip bit into his skin, each strand and knot thick and solid against his back. It hurt like fuck; he yelped and stumbled a little. The next was easier, in a way. He didn't stumble but it still hurt and he cried out, knowing Sheppard would just hit him harder if he tried to be stoic.

By the time the fifth blow landed, Rodney wouldn't have been able to be stoic even if he'd wanted to. He was clinging to the grips on the cuffs now, hanging on while each blow from the cat slammed into his back until he was sure his skin had split open.

Rodney was so caught up in the pain that he hadn't even noticed he was crying until Sheppard stopped and stepped in front of him. "Oh, yeah," Sheppard said as he reached up and cupped Rodney's face in one hand. He ran his thumb across the trail of tears on one of Rodney's cheeks and then leaned in and kissed Rodney hard.

"Two more," Sheppard said, sliding his hand down to the front of Rodney's pants to press against Rodney's dick. "I want two more."

Swallowing hard, Rodney nodded. His back was still on fire and the thought of two more was almost impossible to bear, but Sheppard wanted it and Rodney...he wanted it too. He'd come to need taking it as much as Sheppard needed giving it, and so now he raised his head.

"Please," he said. "Please, John...."

"God," Sheppard muttered, his eyes going dark. "Jesus fucking Christ...." He moved behind Rodney again and Rodney clung to the grips and grit his teeth. "One!"

The whip dug in _hard_ and Rodney threw back his head and screamed. He'd barely had time to recover when Sheppard said, "two!" He let out another scream and then a softer yelp as Sheppard ran a hand over his back. "Oh, yeah," Sheppard said, his voice slurred. "Oh, fuck...."

Suddenly Sheppard was in front of him, grabbing at Rodney's fly and fumbling it open. He shoved Rodney's pants and shorts out of the way and then thumped to his knees. His chest still heaving and tears still running down his cheeks, Rodney stared in shock as Sheppard slid his mouth down over Rodney's dick, sucking hard.

"I'm gonna," he managed to get out, his voice still horse.

"It's okay," Sheppard said. "Go on, boy...give it up." He scraped his teeth over the shaft of Rodney's dick and Rodney moaned and came hard, letting the cuffs hold him up as his knees buckled.

The next few minutes were a little confused and Rodney was too gone on endorphins and the aftermath of one hell of an orgasm to be very helpful as Sheppard unhooked the cuffs, got him out of his pants and then walked him to the bed. He was able to concentrate a little as Sheppard shoved a couple of pillows under him and then slapped the inside of Rodney's thigh.

"Come on, spread for me."

"Mmmmmm...." Rodney spread his legs, humming again as Sheppard slicked him up. "Oh yeahhhhh...."

"You are so far gone," Sheppard said, his voice still rough.

"I really am," Rodney mumbled. "You gonna fuck me?"

"Yeah." Sheppard pushed in sharp and fast and Rodney had a feeling he wasn't going to have time to get hard again, let alone have another orgasm.

He was right; his dick was just starting to take an interest again when Sheppard bent down and rubbed his cheek against Rodney's welted back. The harsh rasp of his stubble surprised a yelp out of Rodney and Sheppard did it again, thrust in hard and came with a low grunt.

Normally Rodney was the one to do the cleaning up, but this time, Sheppard grabbed a towel out of the stack and dealt with it himself.

"Sorry," Rodney mumbled.

"It's okay." Sheppard rested a hand on Rodney's back and Rodney squirmed. "I didn't break the skin," he said, "but you've got some pretty good welts coming up."

"Felt like you tore me open," Rodney said, reaching back awkwardly to run his fingers over what he could reach of his back. It was hot and he could feel the slightly raised welts but it was dry.

"Never," Sheppard said.

* * *

Once, during a long ago family vacation to California, Rodney had gotten a sunburn. It was nothing, he decided now, compared to the pain he felt as he got out of bed the next morning. "Are you sure you didn't break the skin?"

"I didn't," Sheppard said, rolling his eyes. Grabbing Rodney's arm, he dragged him into the bathroom and arranged the mirrors so Rodney could look at his back. "Welts," he said, pressing on one and grinning when Rodney squirmed. "And some deep bruises that will come up in a day or two. You're lucky; you got half of what the Marines usually get."

"I'm not a Marine."

Sheppard rolled his eyes again and dug in a drawer, pulling out a tube of cream. "Here, this'll help."

"What is it?"

"Arnica."

The arnica helped, but Rodney still frowned and dug out his trusty "I'm With Genius" shirt. "Do I have to run this morning?"

"You'll just whine the whole time, won't you?" Sheppard said, reaching for his shaving soap.

"Well, you know how it is, you find something you're good at...."

"Fine," Sheppard said with a chuckle. "Take today and tomorrow off from physical training. We give the Marines a couple days off too; at least I'm not cutting your rations." He lathered up and grabbed his straight razor.

"Seeing as that would make me pass out by lunch time, I appreciate it. You know, it's not that I don't appreciate the effort you and Ronon and everyone else goes to, but I'm never going to be much of a soldier."

"You think that's what we're doing?"

"What with the hand to hand and the shooting and everything?" Surprised, Rodney stared at Sheppard in the mirror. "I just assumed...."

Sheppard turned and looked at Rodney, half of his face still covered with lather. "We're not stupid, you know; we're not trying to make you into a soldier. For one thing, you're much more valuable as a scientist."

"Then what?" Rodney began.

"We're trying to turn you into someone who can give orders to soldiers." Sheppard paused and then added. "Someone whose orders they'll take."

Rodney blinked. "Um...." He shook his head. "Most of your guys think of me as some kind of...." He almost said pet. "Cute mascot."

"Is that what you think?" Sheppard went back to shaving. "Maybe back when you were first here, but now? Not so much."

Rodney opened his mouth to argue and then thought of Phillips, doing his best to be polite. "Huh."

"You said it yourself; there's a lot of speculation as to what goes on in here. Ruiz is a damn good NCO, but the fact that I borrowed her cat is way too juicy a bit of gossip. By dinner there will be bets going as to how many strokes I gave you."

"Too bad I can't get in on some of that action," Rodney said. "I'm almost out of chocolate."

With a snort, Sheppard rolled his towel and flicked Rodney with it. "You are so unsubtle."

"It's worth a try."

Sheppard, as it turned out, was wrong about the timing. Rodney sent Phillips to the mess hall to pick up a mid-morning snack, and when he came back, he seemed even more subdued than he had the day before.

"Okay," Rodney said, after exchanging an amused glance with Namin. "Here's the thing. I know it's weird, working with your CO's boy, but you really have to get used to it or you're going to spend more time blushing than I do."

"Um...."

"It was an even dozen," Rodney said, feeling a little smug as Phillips's eyes went wide. "Feel free to go to Campbell, but I want part of your winnings."

Phillips face relaxed a little. "Can't," he said. "It'd be inside information."

"Damnit; I really need to find out how to get a piece of that action."

Both Namin and Mullins laughed, and after a moment Phillips did, too.

"Okay, muffin time is over; let's get back to work," Rodney said, hiding a smiled as he poured himself another cup of coffee and turned back to his workbench.

In the end, it only took Rodney a day and two energy pistols before he finally figured out the pistol's power systems. "It's a crystal battery," he said to Sheppard and Ronon. "It looks like there was a specific tool for opening them to get the battery out; it's something we can machine easily enough. I'm not sure if they just replaced the battery or actually charged them."

Ronon picked up one of the crystal batteries and turned it over in his fingers. "Can you recharge it?"

"I think so," Rodney said. "After all, Jeannie was able to come up with a rechargeable crystal battery for the laptops. If I can take a look at that set up, I can probably modify it."

"Good," Sheppard said.

"There's one thing, though. I don't think the Travelers, or at least the ones on the _Beltarin_ , know how to swap batteries out. I'd say they've found a cache of weapons somewhere and are going through them."

"What makes you think that?" Sheppard asked.

"Wonder who made the original cache." Ronon said at the same time.

"Like I said, there was a specific tool used to open up the battery compartment. I'm thinking it was a pretty ubiquitous tool and yet there weren't any in with the pistols they gave us." He turned to Ronon.

"As for your question: I don't _think_ they're Ancient." He held up a piece of one of the pistols. "It's not the same design aesthetic at all."

"No, it isn't." Ronon frowned. "But it's not a Wraith or Replicator aesthetic either."

"Could there be another technologically advanced species out there?" It wasn't something  
Rodney liked to think about, and from the look on Sheppard's face he wasn't all that wild about it, either. "Do we know where the Travelers come from?"

"Might not be a bad idea to try and find out," Ronon said.

"Yeah," Sheppard said shortly. "Rodney, do you think you can figure out a way to recharge these crystals?"

"Sure. How fast I do it depends on whether or not Jeannie lets me look at her specs for the laptop crystal recharger."

"I'll talk to her," Sheppard said.

"No, it's okay. " Rodney put the piece of pistol down. "I'll do it."

* * *

He found Jeannie in the main lab, leaning over Simpson's shoulder to look at her computer screen. "No, see, if you...."

"Oh right, but...."

They both looked up when he cleared his throat.

"Meredith?" Jeannie said, looking surprised. "What do you want?"

"I've got a question for you," he said, stuffing his hands in his pockets and then wincing a little as the movement pulled his shirt across his sore back. "I need a little help with something I'm working on...."

Jeannie looked around the room and everyone ducked their heads and pretended to work. "All right, c'mon," she said, heading toward a door at the back of the lab.

He'd never been in her office and was a little surprised at how nice it was. Sheppard's office was plain and full of utilitarian furniture and no decoration, but Jeannie's had a heavily carved desk and an ergonomic chair from Earth, and there was a comfortable looking sofa with embroidered cushions that looked like Athosian work.

"Nice," he said, looking around.

"I get by," she said. "So, what do you really want?"

"I was serious." Rodney dug into his pocket and held out a couple of the spent crystals from the energy pistols. "These are from the Traveler's guns. I'm trying to figure out a way to recharge them and I wondered if I could look at your work on the laptop crystal rechargers."

She leaned over and took the crystal from his hand and looked at it. "So that's what powers them?"

"Yeah, and let me tell you, they're a real bitch to open up."

"Why should I share my research with you?"

Rodney had been half-expecting something like this, and he sighed and held out his hand for the crystal. "You know what? Never mind. I'll just open up one of the laptop battery rechargers down in my own lab and reverse engineer something."

She dropped the crystal in his hand. "Don't bother, I'll send you the files." She leaned back and looked at him. "So, it's all bullshit, isn't it?"

"What?"

"You and John. I mean, of course I know he's fucking you, but your whole act with the wincing and everything...." She shook her head. "It may work on some people, but I don't buy it."

"What?" Rodney was sure he looked stupid, but he couldn't help staring at her in surprise. "I thought that was the whole point of me being here. You _gave_ me to him!"

"I didn't say that I thought you two were playing pattycakes, but this gossip going around that he borrowed Ruiz's cat to use on you? Please." She rolled her eyes. "It might impress the grunts...."

Moving very deliberately, Rodney put the crystal back in his pocket and then took a deep breath. Reaching for the hem of his t-shirt, he turned around until his back was to her and then pulled it all the way up, biting his lip as the fabric dragged over the welts.

After a moment, he let the shirt fall back down and headed for the door without looking at her.

After the door slid open, he paused. "Was there anything else, Dr. McKay?"

"No," Jeannie replied, her voice as steady and as distant as his. "I'll send you those files."

"Thank you."

His hands were still clenched when he walked into his lab.

"That fucking _bitch_ ," he snarled, turning and kicking one of the whiteboard stands. The board crashed to the floor and he kicked it again. "Goddamn her...I should have just let Kaleb take her to one of those damn meetings...should have let StateSec...." He kicked the whiteboard again, a little startled when it skittered across the room and slammed against the wall.

"Rodney?"

Rodney turned, his hand raised. Namin squared his jaw but didn't try to duck, even though Rodney knew damn well Namin could have him on the floor in a matter of seconds. Lowering his hand, he turned to see Mullins and Phillips staring at him in surprise.

He turned his back on all of them, staring blindly at one of the other whiteboards while he tried to get his breathing under control. His eyes were burning and he realized with a sudden rush of embarrassment that he was close to tears.

"What the hell did she think...?" he whispered.

"Break time," he heard Mullins say.

"Rodney?" Namin said again after a moment. "They are gone."

"Yeah," Rodney said, his voice sounding weird, even to himself.

"Do you...should I go?"

"God, being a teenager sucks," Rodney finally said, turning around. He stared at the whiteboard he'd kicked and bent to pick it up. The stand was twisted and broken and he let the board fall to the ground again. "I just...I don't know. I feel like an idiot. Like a stupid kid."

"You are not."

"Yeah, I guess...." Rodney looked down at the whiteboard. The calculations and equations on it didn't even make sense, and he turned and looked at Namin. "You wanna go down to the gym?"

The small gym set aside for AR-1 was empty, and after getting his Athosian work out clothes out of his locker, Rodney pulled his shirt off without even thinking about it. As he kicked his shoes off and reached for the buttons of his pants, he looked up to find Namin staring at his back.

Instead of looking away, Namin tilted his head. "Do you...how do you...?"

"What do people say?"

"No one thinks...I do not think that you are weak."

"I know that much." Feeling a little foolish, Rodney stripped off his jeans and pulled on the loose pants, although he left the shirt in the locker.

"Some say that you do not...that you just bear it because it is what the Colonel likes." Namin sat down and pulled his boots off. "Other people think you like it."

"And you?"

"I...." Namin ducked his head as he pulled his socks off.

Rodney waited and finally Namin looked up at him. "I got into trouble when I was young; I have been switched more than once." He took a deep breath. "I do not understand how anyone could like it, but I believe that you do."

"You know how when you run really far or when you have a really good work out session? When you really push it hard and everything hurts?" Namin nodded and Rodney continued. "And then you push past it and all of a sudden you feel great? That's what it's like."

Namin looked a little skeptical and Rodney laughed shortly. "It's a chemical thing; I'm sure Dr. Keller could explain it better. It's just...for some people it's just that, a runner's high. For some people, it's mixed up with sex. I don't get turned on when I run or work out...."

"Unless Colonel Sheppard is throwing you around."

Rodney laughed. "Fair enough. But I don't exactly get hard every time I stub my toe. It's just when he...." Rodney shrugged. "So yeah, I like it."

He waited a minute and then looked over at Namin. "Does that...it doesn't freak you out too much?"

"Rodney...." Namin shook his head. "I do not exactly understand, but, I am," he paused and then continued solemnly. "I am sworn to protect you."

"I know," Rodney said, remembering how Namin had backed him during the coup attempt, even when he'd though that Rodney was taking Lorne's offer. And, now that he thought about it, neither Sheppard nor Teyla had punished Namin for it, even though Sheppard had to know that Namin had been kind of pissed at him for the way things went down on Larish.

He reached out and put his hand on Namin's shoulder. "And it means, well, it means a lot to me."

There was a pause and then Namin grinned up at him. "Anyway, you freak me out about once a day."

"Oh, you are so gonna pay for that...."

"You can try," Namin said, kicking out and trying to hook his foot around Rodney's. Rodney twisted out of the way and Namin rushed him.

They'd each brought the other down a few times when the door opened. Rodney didn't look up--he had Namin pinned down and he didn't want to lose his advantage.

"Nice," Sheppard said and Namin slapped the ground twice. Rodney moved off him and looked up at Sheppard, who was grinning. "Who's winning?"

"Sadly, he is," Rodney said. "But only two to three."

"You're getting better." Sheppard moved over to his locker. "Namin? You wanna give us a minute?"

Namin glanced over at Rodney--and why had Rodney never realized that he always did that--checked with Rodney before obeying Sheppard? Rodney nodded, and Namin grabbed his shirt and slipped out the door.

"I went by your lab," Sheppard said as he stripped out of his uniform. "Someone really tore up a whiteboard stand."

"Well, you know Mullins, she's wild and crazy that way," Rodney said lightly. Sheppard snorted.

"Okay, fine, I had an angry kid _thing_ that I'm really kind of embarrassed by and would really not like to talk about, if that's okay with you."

Sheppard paused, naked, and Rodney stared at him. He rarely got a chance to really look at Sheppard like this and he caught his breath a little. Sheppard blinked and looked at him. "What?"

"Just...sometimes I can't believe you want me."

Sheppard rolled his eyes and Rodney shook his head. "I know, I know; it sounds like flattery and we can get back to my little moment in the lab in a minute, but you're really fucking hot. It just surprises me that you...." He ducked his head a little.

"If you're trying to appeal to my vanity...."

Rodney opened his mouth to protest and Sheppard suddenly smiled ruefully.

"...it's working."

Still sitting on the floor, Rodney squirmed out of his pants and then went onto his hands and knees and crawled across the warm floor to kneel at Sheppard's feet. "Please," he said, sliding his hands up Sheppard's thighs. "I need...let me?"

Sheppard reached down and ran his fingers through Rodney's hair. "You have a plan, boy?"

Rodney nodded. "Please, Sir. Just sit down and let me take care of you?"

After a moment's pause, Sheppard nodded and sat down on the padded window seat. He leaned back against the window, looked at Rodney and smirked. "Well?"

Leaning forward, Rodney slid his mouth down over Sheppard's cock. He was already half-hard; all it took was a little bit of suction and some tongue work and Rodney's mouth was full. He was half-afraid Sheppard would take over, and while Rodney didn't have a problem with the way Sheppard liked to use his mouth, he did have other plans.

But Sheppard seemed content to lean back and let Rodney do things in his own time, although he shifted a little when Rodney pressed a couple fingers into his mouth along with Sheppard's cock. Rodney wanted to laugh; did Sheppard really think Rodney was going to try to stick...well, _anything_ up his ass?

Once he'd gotten both his fingers and Sheppard's cock good and wet, Rodney pulled back, knelt up and pressed his fingers up into himself. Sheppard's smirk came back and he reached for Rodney when Rodney straddled him.

"Is face to face okay? Or do you want me the other way?"

"This is good," Sheppard said, his hands going tight on Rodney's hips. Rodney reached between them and positioned Sheppard's cock so he could sink down on it. It burned and Rodney bit his lip, moving slowly. He was surprised that Sheppard let him set the pace, but while he was sure he'd have new bruises over the old ones on his hips, Sheppard seemed content to just hold on to him.

It was hard to keep his balance, and finally Rodney had to lean forward and plant his hands on the wall on either side of Sheppard's face. "God," he moaned as he found the right angle. "Oh God...."

"You love it, don't you?" Sheppard said, looking up at him. "Love a hard dick, _my_ hard dick up your ass."

"Yeah," Rodney said. "Fuck...yeah...."

"Greedy little whore," Sheppard said, and Rodney felt that twist deep in his stomach, the same feeling he'd felt in front of the mirror the other day. Sheppard must have figured it out, because he smiled up at Rodney. "You came to me," he continued. "You want it so much you crawled across the floor to get it."

"Can't...can't help it," Rodney said, and okay, he was pushing it a little, but Sheppard just gave him an amused look.

"You'd say anything, wouldn't you? Tell me anything to get more dick."

Rodney opened his mouth and then paused, going still with Sheppard's cock buried deep inside him. "No," he finally said, once he had his breath back. "I'll play it up, tell you things I know you like to hear. Hell, I like saying them, but...."

"But?"

"I won't lie about it. If I beg, if I tell you that I need it, that I love it, it's the truth."

Sheppard slid a hand up Rodney's back, pressing his fingers lightly against the welts. Rodney squirmed a little, but Sheppard kept going until his fingers were tangled in Rodney's hair. He twisted his hand and Rodney winced. "And if you don't love it? If I did something you hated?"

"I'm yours," Rodney said, looking him right in the eye. "I'd grit my teeth or yell or scream. And I'd get through it."

"And you say we'll never make a soldier out of you."

"I'm not like that. I don't do it for them." Rodney's heart was hammering in his chest but he said it any way. "I do it for you, John."

Sheppard stared at Rodney and then closed his eyes. "Fuck," he said softly, almost as if he didn't want Rodney to hear him. "Rodney...I...."

Rodney waited, but Sheppard shook his head a little and then reached back down, tightening his grip on Rodney's ass. "Hold on," he said, and stood up.

The wall was cool against Rodney's welts, but once Sheppard started fucking him hard, he could feel each thrust slamming him into the wall. It was brilliant, and all Rodney could do was wrap his arms around Sheppard's neck, hold on and take it.

"Yeah," Sheppard grunted. "Fuck you...so hard...."

"Do it...God, do it...please please please...."

"Yeah, come for me."

Rodney was still shuddering through the aftershocks when Sheppard shoved up into him hard and came.

"So," Sheppard said a few moments later. They were back on the window seat and Rodney's workout shirt had been sacrificed in the name of clean up. "What pissed you off so much?"

"Jeannie," Rodney said shortly. When Sheppard raised an eyebrow, Rodney sighed. "She thinks I play up what you do to me for sympathy."

"You do." Rodney scowled at him but Sheppard just laughed a little. "Oh, come on, I've seen you do it."

"Okay, fine, but not with Jeannie. And not to the extent she thinks I do."

Sheppard's hand moved across Rodney's back and Rodney shivered. "What did you tell her?"

"I didn't say anything, just showed her my back. She...well, I didn't really give her a chance to say much after that."

There was a moment of silence.

"I hate my brother," Sheppard finally said. Rodney waited for more, but Sheppard just lifted one shoulder in a vague shrug.

"I need her, so don't kill her, okay?"

"I won't," Rodney said. "Tempting as it might be."

 _At least not until I'm ready to replace her._

* * *

Even John had to admit that when Rodney went after a problem, he really went after it. Less than a week after he'd started working on the energy pistols, he not only had a recharger for the batteries, but he'd sketched out and then manufactured the tool required to pop the battery casing open. John was pretty sure that, if he put Rodney up to it, Rodney would be able to reverse engineer the whole pistol fairly quickly.

"There's only one problem," John said to Ronon one morning.

"You don't want to give them to anyone you don't trust."

"Exactly." In spite of the cold, John had steered them out onto the east pier during their run and now he paused and looked back over the city. "Even more, I don't want any of them making their way back to Earth."

Ronon looked at him for a long moment. "Sheppard?"

"Yeah?"

"What are your plans?'

"Short term? I pretty much want to stay alive and keep my position here."

"Long term?" Ronon asked.

It took John a moment; Ronon was one of the few people he tried to be honest with. "I try not to think beyond destroying the Wraith." He paused. "Look, I trust you more than I trust just about anyone, but I'm a pretty paranoid guy."

"I've noticed." Ronon shrugged. "I know you're not going back to Earth, and that's enough for me."

He looked up and met Ronon's eyes. "If I die, I want you to make sure that my ashes are scattered here, that my body doesn't get sent back there."

"If you die, chances are good I'm dead too."

"Ronon."

"I promise."

Without another word, John stretched and headed back toward the city, Ronon at his back.

* * *

"I need to talk to you," he said, poking his head into Rodney's lab later that afternoon.

"Quitting time," Rodney said without looking up from his computer. "See you guys tomorrow."

Once everyone had left, Rodney smiled at John. "And what can I do for you, Sir?"

"Take a walk with me. Oh, and bring your tablet."

After stopping so Rodney could grab a jacket, they headed out to the southwest pier. It had been clear and cool all day, but John could see clouds gathering on the western horizon.

 _How appropriate,_ he thought dryly. He led Rodney to a steep metal staircase that took them down to a ledge under the main pier.

"What's with all the cloak and dagger?"

"I want people to think we're indulging in a little al fresco action," John said after checking his scanner and life signs detector. He turned and looked at Rodney. "I need some estimates and some information."

"Okay."

"If I give you the crate of energy pistols, how long will it take you to get them all charged up?"

"You said there are about seventy-five of them?" John nodded. "As long as there's nothing wrong with them aside from the batteries, three or four days? I can put Namin on it."

"Good. That's the easy part. How about reverse engineering them?"

"I've already poked at them a bit," Rodney said, and John couldn't help smiling at him. "What?"

"I should have known."

"Yeah, well...." Rodney tapped at his tablet for a moment and sighed. "They're a lot more straightforward than Wraith pistols. Even with the stun setting, they're still simpler."

John nodded. "I'm hearing a 'but' in there."

"Yeah. The thing is, while I could work up a diagram for one pretty easily...maybe in a week if I concentrated, actually building one is another story. In addition to machining the parts, there's the matter of power crystals." He shrugged. "That's where it gets complicated."

"I was afraid you'd say that."

"Sorry," Rodney said.

"Don't worry about it. How's the drone weapon research going?"

"It's not." John frowned and Rodney's chin went up. "I had to put it aside to work on the pistols. And before that, you wanted me cataloging the City's internal defenses. And then there's the _Endeavour_...." He spread his hands. "Even with Phillips there are only four of us, and while Namin's a competent lab tech, he's no engineer."

"Relax," John said. "I think we need to prioritize."

"It'd help if I knew what was going on. I mean, I'll work on anything you want me to, of course, but I'd be more on track if I knew if the _Endeavor_ is more important than, say, destroying the Wraith or keeping tabs on the rest of the Expedition."

Staring out across the ocean, John leaned back against the wall. He knew damn well that he had to trust someone, that this had to start somewhere, but still, this was something he didn't even let himself think about most of the time.

Next to him Rodney was unusually still and quiet.

"Let's say I wanted to limit our dependency on Earth."

"Are things getting worse back there?"

"There?" John crossed his arms across his chest. "Not 'home?'"

"Oh, please, tell me you're not really surprised."

"No." And now John smiled at him. "Not at all."

"I'd say forget about alien weapons for the moment," Rodney said after a moment. "More than anything else, we depend on Earth for ammunition, right? I've run across a couple of Ancient machining setups, and even modern gunpowder is easy. With just a couple of even halfway competent engineers and a chemist, we could be churning out more than enough ammo."

"We need more than bullets to defend the City."

"Huh. You know, you can't really look at the internal defenses without getting a good idea of the external defenses and weapons systems as well. We still have all the weapons that were brought in when you made contact with Earth during the Wraith siege, but I'm thinking that, if you're defending against...." He paused and looked at John.

"Okay, fine; I'll say it," Rodney continued when John didn't say anything.. "If we're trying to defend ourselves against the _Daedalus_ or the _Apollo_ , then yeah, I need to look for drones and other Ancient weapons. And we really need another ZPM."

"Yeah," John said. "That's a given. Having a working ship of our own would be good too."

"But we do," Rodney said. When John blinked at him, he ducked his head a little. "With all due respect, Sir...."

"Out with it."

"Atlantis isn't just a city."

John stared. "Goddamn," he finally said after a long silence. "I...goddamn." Even as he said it, scenarios were spinning through his mind, each one better than the one before it. There was only one problem. He knew himself well enough to know that he wasn't a tactical genius, at least not on the large scale.

"I need to know," he said, more to himself than to Rodney, "if they remember that too."

"That," Rodney said, "I can't tell you. Although," he added, "aren't the chances pretty good that there's more than one spy among the prisoners and new Marines?"

"Oh, I've been assuming there were. But the problem is, low level spies aren't very useful; they never know anything." He leaned back and looked at the clouds--they were darker and closer than they had been earlier. "But never mind that, we still need to find out who the spies are and maybe, if we're lucky, that first level could be reporting to someone here."

"I would think you wouldn't want that."

"If we know who they report to, then we know who's sifting the information. If we know what they're sending back and who they're sending it to...." He looked over at Rodney, a plan suddenly snapping into place. "You know, I think you can help me out here."

Rodney snorted. "Um...sorry. But really, no one is going to volunteer any information to me, no matter how pathetic I look."

The more John thought about it, the more he liked his idea. "No, but say you had reason to dislike someone...and you just happened to get your hands on them...."

"You're suggesting _I_ question someone?" Rodney, John could tell, still didn't get it. "Why me?"

"With the person I have in mind? Any number of reasons...jealousy, maybe."

"Him," Rodney said, scowling. "Alexander."

"That's my boy."

Rodney didn't say anything and after a moment, John frowned. "What?"

"You'll have to bring him back here and...I...." Rodney kept his head down.

" _What?_ "

"Nothing. I just...it won't be an act. I'm not saying you can't do what you like...Jesus, the idea of me telling you...but...I...it won't be an act." Rodney's knees were tucked up against his chest and now he wrapped his arms around them. He looked a little lost and a lot young and John, who had always hated it when people tried to make personal claims on him, wanted him fiercely.

"Give me your belt," he said and Rodney's head snapped up.

"Um...okay. Yes, sir," he added quickly, when John glared at him.

Rodney was clearly expecting to be beaten, but his hand was steady as he pulled his belt off, went to his knees and handed it over to John.

"Stay there," John said, kneeling behind him. He pulled Rodney's wrists together behind his back and then wrapped the belt around them. Keeping one hand on Rodney's shoulder, he pushed him down until Rodney realized what John wanted and went down on one shoulder, cheek pressed to the metal decking.

"Good boy." John pulled out the lube out of Rodney's pocket before shoving Rodney's pants and shorts out of the way, but he didn't bother with more than a cursory slicking of his own dick and Rodney's hole before he pushed in hard. Rodney moaned and took it easily, his hands twisting a little against the belt.

"Mine," John said, resting one hand on Rodney's wrists as he set up a hard driving pace. "Aren't you?"

"Yes, Sir," Rodney gasped out. "Yours...God...yours...only you."

 _Or maybe not,_ John thought, going still as a sudden idea came to him. _Maybe not_ just _me._

"Sir?" Rodney craned his neck a little and looked up at John, his brows furrowed.

"I just had the best idea," John murmured, pressing down on Rodney's hands. But when Rodney raised an eyebrow, John just laughed and went back to fucking him.

After, when Rodney was curled up next to John, all relaxed and looking just a little debauched with his head on John's thigh, John played with his collar and watched as whitecaps started to show against the dark ocean.

"We were never meant to be anything but a research station and dumping ground for dissidents, failures and people like me and your sister and Elizabeth.

"Dangerous people," he added when Rodney made a questioning noise, "who made what were considered to be poor decisions. I know for a fact that they told my father that I'd volunteered for an undercover mission that I might not come back from."

"Jeannie told me that it was a secret government project and that they were watching all of her correspondence so even our code would be noticed." Rodney shrugged a little. "I guess if you'd all vanished without a trace, I'd have been told there was a safety failure and she'd died."

"Probably."

"What's Dr. Weir's story?"

"She helped Hayes get elected," John said. "In fact, I first met her at a fundraiser Dad's wife threw back when I was still married and getting invited to their parties." His hand went tight on Rodney's collar for a moment but Rodney remained silent.

"I think Elizabeth's here because she knows where too many of the bodies are buried. Mostly metaphorical, although for all I know she helped bury Kinsey after he 'disappeared.'" John shrugged. "She's useful enough, I guess."

"Does she...." Rodney paused and twisted so he could look up at John. "Have you told anyone else?"

John didn't bother pretending he didn't know what Rodney was talking about. "Ronon asked me what my plans were. I'm pretty sure he has a general idea, but other than that...no."

"Oh." John watched as Rodney digested that and when he reached up and covered John's hand on his collar, John didn't move.

"I wonder," Rodney said, a little later. He paused and then took a deep breath. "Can you do this without Jeannie?"

"Do you think she'll go for it?"

"There's no reason for her not to." Rodney turned his head and looked out over the water. "Back on Earth, she's got to compete with the scientists at the SGC as well as the rest of the scientific community. Out here, she's the only scientist of her caliber in an entire galaxy."

"Selling yourself a bit short, aren't you?"

"Not really. I don't have the years of education and experience she does."

"You could get it if you went back to Earth."

John waited, but Rodney was quiet for a long time. Finally, just as John was about to say something, Rodney rolled over until he was on his back, his head still on John's thigh.

"I know you don't always believe what people tell you," he began, looking up at John.

"Because people are liars," John said, feeling oddly defensive.

"They really are," Rodney agreed. "But the thing is, please believe me when I say I don't want the same things I wanted when I was back on Earth."

"Because of me." John could hear the skepticism in his voice, but Rodney just smiled wryly.

"That's certainly part of it," he said. "But...some of it is Atlantis. I'm not sitting in a classroom somewhere, fighting for attention and lab time and having all my best ideas stolen by my professors. Maybe I'll never have initials after my name, but I dunno...I'm _doing_ things here. I don't care about the rest of it as much as I used to."

"Really."

John knew he sounded distant and he wasn't surprised when Rodney looked almost insulted.

"Yes, really."

"It's just," John began, staring out at the ocean. "I feel like that. What happens here is more real, more intense than anything on Earth could ever be."

"More danger," Rodney said. "More opportunity. More power. For you, I mean."

 _Not to mention that I can have things I can't have on Earth,_ John thought as he rested a hand on Rodney's collar again.

"Yeah," he said. "All that."

Across the ocean, lightning flared.

"Did you plan on having this discussion in conjunction with the storm?" Rodney asked, as the sounds of the thunder reached them. "Because I have to admit it's pretty dramatic."

"Never let it be said that I don't have a sense of occasion."

"God forbid." Rodney's tone was as dry as John's, but his smile was unexpectedly genuine.

* * *

As much as John wanted to start tracking down spies, he held off for a while. Rodney was hard at work on the City's defenses, back on the elusive trail of the drone manufacturing station he was sure existed somewhere in the city. John still made him run in the mornings, but he cut his time in the gym and range down to twice a week to give him more time to work.

John's team had a couple of missions and finally, during a visit to the Mial on M68-259, he got a chance to talk to Teyla while Jeannie and Ronon met with the town's engineer. The Mial had the best beer garden John had seen outside of the German Protectorate and he settled down with Teyla at a somewhat secluded table. The beer was good, the sun was shining and the air was crisp and clean; he'd have to wait quite a while for a better chance to have this conversation.

After making sure they weren't being scanned, he set his scanner and life signs detector on the table in front of them and then leaned back to look at Teyla.

"What is on your mind, John?"

"The future."

She raised an eyebrow. "Oh? That is unusual."

"Yeah, yeah," John said, waving a hand. "That's me...never thinking of tomorrow. But ever since the thing with Lorne...." He shrugged and sipped his beer. "It'll just keep happening. I'm not the guy they want guarding the back door."

"No." She smiled. "Blind loyalty is not one of your virtues."

"I'm going to take that as a compliment."

"It was intended as one." She took a drink of beer, looking at him over the rim of her mug. "So, am I to assume that your idea of the future does not involve Earth's interests?"

"I'm not going to give the Wraith Earth's coordinates; I owe the State that much. But that's about as far as I'm willing to go."

 _Although that's subject to change,_ John thought. If it came down to a choice between the Wraith taking Atlantis or Earth...well, John didn't owe the State _that_ much.

"And what do you owe Atlantis and this galaxy? Or is it the other way around; should I be asking what you think Atlantis and my galaxy owe you?"

"A little of both, I suppose." Before he could say more, she leaned forward.

"John, do your plans go beyond controlling Atlantis?"

"Aside from killing the Wraith off, I'm not sure." She looked at him steadily and he sighed. "Atlantis can't exist in a vacuum; you know that. We can't feed ourselves, and there are other resources we need but don't have. Do I want to create some kind of vast, galaxy wide empire out here?" He shook his head. "No.

"Do I want Atlantis and her allies to be the only major power in this galaxy? Yes."

"I must admit, I would rather my people were allied with an independent Atlantis. From what I have seen, we mean little to Earth's government."

"Yeah, you've got that right." John finished off his beer. "And, trust me, I know damn well how much we owe you; we wouldn't have survived without you and your people. Why do you think we're having this conversation? I'm going to need your help."

Teyla smiled. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"Trusting me. Admitting that you need someone."

"Ha ha." He paused and gestured for more beer. "We need more weapons than we have," he said after the boy had dropped off another round. "I've got Rodney working on that but, smart as he is, he's still an uneducated kid."

"Do you really believe Jeannie would betray you?"

John frowned. While it made talking to her easier, it was still a little unnerving when Teyla figured out what he was really saying.

"I don't always know what her agenda is. If she wants the prestige that will come back on Earth when she can finally publish," he replied, "I'm not sure I can count on her to help us break with Earth."

Teyla shook her head. "I do not believe that is her first priority."

"What is?"

"Knowing things," Teyla said, and yeah, she was right. In that, at least, Jeannie and Rodney were alike. "And power."

"Rodney said something along those lines. That she doesn't have to compete with anyone out here."

"Rodney is very observant."

"Am I right to trust him?"

"John," and now she looked disapproving. "You do not really need to ask me that."

"Okay, fine. Do you really believe I should trust Jeannie?"

"Yes," Teyla said firmly. "And Ronon, of course."

"Well, yeah." John took a deep breath. "And Elizabeth?"

"I believe so. Can you use the City's systems to keep a watch on her?"

"I think so; I'll talk to Rodney about it." He looked up and saw Jeannie and Ronon approaching them.

"I could kill someone for a beer right now," Jeannie said and gestured to the boy. "Remind me again why I bust my ass for these people?"

"They pay us in really good beer," Ronon said. "And you like that pink fruit."

"Oh, right," Jeannie said.

"Ronon," John asked, once they all had more beer. "Talk to me about Jordan and Teldy."

"They're both solid," Ronon said quickly. He took a long drink of beer, and then looked at John. "You're making your move?"

"Your move?" Jeannie looked from John to Ronon. "What's this?"

"What would you do if you were recalled to Earth?" John asked.

Jeannie's eyes went wide. "Oh, shit, they're not really recalling us, are they?" Her obvious concern made John feel better about the conversation.

"No, but what if they did?"

"One thing you can say for the Mial, they appreciate my talent," Jeannie said, looking around the bright, bustling beer garden and out to the town square. "I could do pretty well here."

Teyla gave John an "I told you so" look and Jeannie's eyes narrowed a little. "You're going to do it, aren't you?" she asked. Before John could answer, she continued. "It's about time; I was beginning to wonder if you had the balls for it."

"Thanks, McKay." John took a deep breath. "There are a lot of things we need, but most of all...."

"A ZPM," Jeannie said.

"Yeah, preferably two, " John said. "Obviously weapons and allies and a better supply line are on the list, but it all comes down to power."

"Weir isn't stupid," Ronon said. "If we start shifting our mission priorities, she's going to wonder what we're up to."

"I don't trust her as far as I can throw her," Jeannie said, leaning back and crossing her arms across her chest.

"Teyla thinks we can," John said.

"That's rich coming from you; you hate her."

"I hate a lot of people," John replied with a scowl. "We don't have to tell her everything and we can keep a really close eye on her."

"If you say so," Jeannie said. "But I draw the line at Zelenka."

"I agree; we'll leave him where he is for now."

That John was thinking of using Zelenka as a hostage for Elizabeth's good behavior was something he thought he should keep to himself.

Later, as they headed toward the gate, he glanced over at Jeannie. "Do you want me to have Rodney start combing the database for possible ZPM locations?"

"He knows about...no, never mind. Of course he knows." She frowned thoughtfully. "I should talk to him; I know which addresses we've already tried. There's no need to reinvent the wheel, after all."

John thought about asking her to let up on Rodney, but no--he was already more involved in McKay family dynamics than he wanted to be. Let Rodney and Jeannie sort it out or not. As long as both of them survived the experience, he really didn't care.

* * *

"Meredith?"

Rodney looked up from his computer and blinked in surprise.

"Jeannie? What do you want?" She scowled, probably because he didn't call her "Dr. McKay" but he just mentally shrugged it off. It was childish, but he knew she called him Meredith because he hated it.

"I need to talk to you. Alone."

"Break time," Rodney said to the lab at large. "Can one of you go grab me a muffin or a donut or something?"

"Look at you," Jeannie said after everyone had filed out. "All important with your own staff."

"Yeah, that's me; Atlantis' empire builder."

"Interesting of you to put it that way, since your boyfriend actually holds that title these days."

"I assume the colonel's plans are why you're here?"

She stopped looking around the room and settled down in Namin's chair. "Did he tell you that he wants us to step up our search for ZPMs?" When Rodney nodded, she continued. "You're actually better with the database than I am and we can't trust this search to any of my people."

"Okay...." Rodney knew better than to thank her for the compliment if he didn't want an insult to follow it up. "But you know which addresses you've already visited."

"Exactly," she said, holding out a memory stick. "Here's an annotated list of all the addresses we've checked out. If you have any questions...." She sounded almost uncertain as her voice trailed off and Rodney looked up in surprise.

"Well, come to me," she finally said. "I'll try to be a little more...." She shrugged.

"I'm glad you sent for me," Rodney finally muttered, looking at his feet. "It's better than being a ward of the state back on Earth."

"Well, of course it is," she said. "I haven't forgiven you, you know."

"I wouldn't expect you to. Just remember...I was only eleven at the time."

"And you wouldn't do it now?"

Rodney shrugged. "I've seen how you are here; I'd probably let you handle him."

"Let me?"

Before he could say anything, she shook her head. "Anyway, do your best to find us an address or two."

"Yeah."

After the door closed behind her, Rodney took a deep breath and looked at the stick in his hand. _Was she actually trying to apologize?_ At the sound of the door opening again, he quickly tucked the stick into the port on his laptop.

"You're not bleeding," Mullins said, handing him a muffin.

"Not yet, at least," Rodney said absently.

Bringing up the list of planets the various teams had visited, Rodney frowned as he went through the expedition's first few months. Many of the missions were supply or reconnaissance missions and most of the addresses had been supplied by the Athosians or by new allies. Later, there had been a list of planets that might have ZPMs that apparently came from some version of Dr. Weir who'd gotten trapped in the past, but still, Rodney was pretty sure that, once the 'Lanteans had taken the ZPMs from the Brotherhood and from the planet of the feral children, they'd had their hands full with the Wraith attacks and Earth politics and hadn't had the time to search out additional power sources.

 _I wonder if there could be ZPMs or even leads on planets they've already visited._

The database was huge and even using Ancient equipment it took a while to search, particularly after Rodney restricted it to a protected terminal that wouldn't alert anyone to the system activity. He set up a search for off world weapons research stations and bases and then added in Jeannie's list of addresses just to see if any matches came up.

As much as he wanted to read through the notes on Jeannie's list, he knew better than to waste the time. With a sigh, he pocketed the stick and turned back to his drone research.

* * *

"Jeannie came by today," Rodney said after dinner that evening.

"Yeah?" Sheppard said, looking up from his computer.

"I started up a search for planets that might have ZPMs, but searching the Ancient database gives new meaning to looking for a needle in a hay stack. Hopefully something will come up." He paused. "Did you talk to the whole team?"

Sheppard nodded. "Yeah, and Ronon brought up a good point--if we start going on ZPM missions, Weir will wonder what we're up to." He leaned back and looked at Rodney. "Talk to me about the Ancient internal security; can we keep an eye on her without anyone knowing?"

"That depends." Rodney sighed. His life would be a lot easier if Sheppard weren't so paranoid. Granted, Sheppard had good cause to be paranoid, but still. "What kind of information are you looking for?"

"I want to know who her allies are here in the city, and whether or not she's having conversations I don't know about with the people back on Earth."

"I thought Jeannie was checking the data stream. She'd be more likely to catch hidden messages than I would be, given that she's the one who designed the data compression system you use."

"Oh, we know Weir's not getting information out on her own," Sheppard said. "But I need to know if she's channeling it through anyone else."

"I can set up the Ancient systems to track her every move without her knowing it if that's what you want, but watching her is going to be a full time job. Don't you have _anyone_ you can trust to do it?"

"That's the problem. Right now I trust the team and you and that's it. Ronon thinks Jordan and Teldy are okay, but they have a lot on their plates as it is."

In an attempt to be practical, Rodney did his best to ignore the warm feeling in his chest brought on by Sheppard's words. "You know, Namin has turned out to be really loyal," he said after a moment's thought. "If all you're looking for initially is a list of Dr. Weir's associates, is there any chance of having an Athosian do it? Someone Teyla trusts?"

"Interesting idea. They wouldn't be loyal to Earth and Teyla does have a way with people who betray her." He gave Rodney a look. "You're good at this, you know."

"I was just thinking that I'm probably not as paranoid as I should be."

Sheppard snorted. "No. You were thinking that you're not as paranoid as I am. Do you really think I don't know what people think about me?"

"Oh, I think you know," Rodney said, hoping he wasn't making a huge mistake. "But I suspect it's like anything else with you. You only care up to the point where the information or the person is useful to you."

For a moment, he thought he'd gone too far, said too much, and he braced for a reaction. Instead, Sheppard got up and poured himself more bourbon. "I grew up knowing that I was the only person I could count on. My dad and my various step-mothers...well, it's better to grow up rich than not, right? All my brother is good for is running the business and he's probably cheating me."

"And you don't care?"

"My mother left me more money than I can spend and no one can touch it but me, so no. If the business is that important to Dave, let him have it." Sheppard knocked back a healthy swallow of his drink.

"Everything I give a damn about is here."

It would have been a much more touching sentiment, Rodney thought, if Sheppard hadn't looked vaguely annoyed. Since there wasn't much he could say and it was pretty clear the moment was over, Rodney just nodded.

"So," Sheppard said, drinking more bourbon. "About keeping an eye on Elizabeth...."

"It'll take a day or two to set the system up; after that, I can have it make recordings and you can talk to Teyla about how you want to work the surveillance."

"Good boy."

Rodney smiled at that and stood up, sliding his boxers down. "I can be even better," he said and, to his relief, Sheppard laughed.

"Get the cuffs--wrists, ankles and thighs--and get on the bed."

As Rodney settled on the bed with the cuffs, Sheppard dug around in a drawer and finally came up with what looked like a very small flogger. "You're going to like this," he said with a smile that suggested Sheppard himself would like it regardless of Rodney's thoughts on the matter.

"Oh?" Rodney wriggled just a little as Sheppard sat next to him on the bed.

"Yeah," Sheppard slid a hand up Rodney's chest, pausing to pinch a nipple. "Wrists."

Rodney held out his wrists, shivering a little as Sheppard buckled the cuffs into place and then hooked them to the headboard. The thigh cuffs followed and then the ankle cuffs, which Sheppard locked to the thigh cuffs. Sheppard then tied the thigh cuffs to the side of the bed, making it impossible for Rodney to close his legs.

"Damn," Sheppard said, settling on the bed between Rodney's thighs. "All I have to do is tie you up and you get hard." He looked at Rodney's cock, smiled and slapped the small flogger into the palm of his hand.

"Oh, God," Rodney muttered, instinctively trying to bring his knees together. Sheppard liked to do this, liked to let Rodney know what he was planning. Rodney wasn't sure he appreciated the warning, particularly since there was nothing he could do to stop Sheppard.

The first blow landed on the underside of Rodney's upper arm, just below his armpit. The flogger was hard and it stung. Rodney yelped and twisted against the cuffs. "Fuck," he muttered, staring at the red marks on his arm. "What's that thing made of?"

"Nice hard rubber," Sheppard said with a pleased little smile. "Hurts, does it?"

"Yeah," Rodney said, staring at the thing. "It does."

"And you like it," Sheppard said, bringing it down on Rodney's chest. At least one of the strands landed on his nipple and he cried out again.

When Rodney finally spoke, his voice was shaky. "Yes," he said, staring up at Sheppard. "I like it."

Sheppard looked pleased. "Good boy." He moved more quickly now, landing blows seemingly at random all over Rodney arms, chest and thighs. Each one stung and soon Rodney was squirming and gasping.

When Rodney finally broke down and begged, he was desperate. The pain was pushing him high and then higher and the words "please" and "more" escaped before he could help it. Sheppard laughed and gripped one of Rodney's thighs tightly.

"Oh, I'll give you more, boy," he said. "I'll give you all you can handle."

Rodney braced himself as well as he could, terrified but wanting all the same, and then Sheppard brought the whip down, not on Rodney's cock as expected, but on the soft, sensitive skin of his balls. Straining against the cuffs, Rodney threw his head back and screamed as his vision went hazy.

"No," he managed to get out. "No more...please...."

"You don't mean that," Sheppard said, doing it again. Rodney screamed once and then again as the whip landed for a third time and then a fourth and even the endorphins flooding through his body didn't stop the tears from coming.

Things got a little hazy for a moment or two--Sheppard hit him a few more times--but then he felt Sheppard's slick fingers teasing his hole and, oh God, yes, getting fucked was exactly what he wanted. Right now.

"Fuck me...please please... _please_ , John...."

Sheppard muttered something, but Rodney was too far gone to hear him. He felt it, though, when Sheppard pushed into him hard and fast and almost clumsy. Bound as he was, Rodney couldn't do anything but lie there and take it. And even though his balls hurt each time Sheppard thrust into him, Rodney _wanted_ it, wanted to know that he drove Sheppard crazy, that he alone could make Sheppard lose it like this.

"Please," he choked out. "Let me...please."

"Do it!" Sheppard snapped, pushing into him hard and then going still. Rodney came and Sheppard shouted something and came as well.

Rodney didn't exactly pass out, but he came close to it. After several moments, the first thing he was really aware of was Sheppard nuzzling his face and licking at the tears on his cheeks. It was only when he stretched that he realized he'd been unbound.

"God," he said, his voice husky from the screaming. "That...fuck, that really hurt."

"Yeah," Sheppard said, sounding extremely satisfied. "I can tell."

Later, while Sheppard snored softly in the bedroom, Rodney stood in front of the full length mirror and did his best to check out his balls. They still hurt like hell, but aside from a little redness, they looked okay. Relieved, because the last thing he wanted to do was see Dr. Keller about his fucking _balls_ , Rodney leaned his forehead against the cool glass and just breathed quietly for a moment.

He no longer really worried about Sheppard going too far because more and more he was beginning to believe there wasn't a too far, no line Sheppard could cross. So far, everything Sheppard had done to him, Rodney had been able to not only bear, but enjoy.

And fine, maybe that made him as much of a pervert as Sheppard, but Rodney didn't care.

* * *

One of the nice things about the people he was working with, Rodney thought as he gave up the pretense of dignity he'd managed during breakfast and just sat on a pillow, was that they were used to him working while recovering from Sheppard's attentions. Even Phillips didn't get all embarrassed any more. Not that the pillow helped all that much, although it was better than nothing. As much as he liked what Sheppard did to him, Rodney really could do without the morning after issues.

Frowning, he settled down behind the console he was using to search the Ancient database and brought up the results so far.

"Oh, no way," he muttered, checking the gate address to make sure he was right.

He was. There really had been a research lab on Larish. Rodney reached up and pinched the bridge of his nose.

Bringing up the notes from the first contact mission with Larish, Rodney read them over. The Larish, it turned out, had traded with the Athosians for a couple of centuries before the expedition from Earth had arrived on Atlantis. Jeannie and Sheppard's notes on that initial mission confirmed what Rodney already knew--the Larish had said they'd trade with Atlantis provided Atlantis dealt with the southern tribes. There had been an exchange of courtesies and then AR-1 had returned to Atlantis to discuss allying themselves with the Larish.

 _And they never thought to check for ZPMs or a lab...._

He did a quick search through the modern database, pulling up what he could on Larish. It was mostly supply stuff; they got a fair amount of their fresh fruits and vegetables from the Larish as well as some of their meat. In return, the Larish got salt--which the 'Lanteans had in abundance--some technical assistance and help with the occasional uprising. At one point one of the other teams had mentioned that the Larish clergy had a library in their main temple, but, near as Rodney could tell, no one had ever investigated it.

 _No time?_ he wondered. _Or just Jeannie deciding that a society with Renaissance-level technology had nothing to offer?_

The search had kicked out two other addresses, neither of which were on Jeannie's list, but it wasn't done yet. Rodney locked the console again and then turned to another console and began setting up a security check on Dr. Weir. It was easier than struggling with the database; Rodney had been working on the Ancient internal security systems for months and he was pretty sure he knew more about it than anyone else in the City.

Weir was working in her office right now; Rodney adjusted the angle until he could see right over her shoulder. It took Rodney a moment to focus on her screen; from what he could see when he managed it, it looked liked she was working on the supply schedule. He'd been curious about just what she did and now, he found himself wondering if Sheppard knew or cared. Sure, Sergeant Linder was the Quartermaster, but Rodney suspected it was Weir who kept track of the allies and what they owed Atlantis and when they'd owed it.

With a mental shrug, Rodney set things up so that the system would keep an eye on Weir 24/7, locked down the console, and then turned back to his other research. _Does anyone notice that I'm doing the work of two or three guys?_ he thought. _Of course not, all they see is Sheppard's boy toy._

Telling himself that it was safer that way, he settled down to do some real work.

* * *

"Do you have a moment, Sir?"

John looked up from his paperwork. Rodney was hovering in the doorway, his tablet in hand. He had an odd expression on his face, and John wondered if he'd found something in the system or if he was still sore from last night.

"C'mon in," he said, not really trying to hide a smug little smile when Rodney winced a little as he sat down. "What's up?" he asked, trying to get the image of Rodney, naked and tied to the bed out of his head.

"Okay, first of all, I have the Ancient's security system keeping a round the clock watch on Dr. Weir. Once you have someone to review the recordings, I'll set something up so they can watch them without going any deeper into the system."

"Sounds good," John said, far more impressed than he let on. "I talked to Teyla earlier; she should have someone for us in the next couple of days."

"Good." Rodney looked down at his tablet, shaking his head like he couldn't believe what was on it.

"And?"

"As far as the hunt for a ZPM, I've been looking for Ancient outposts and research stations and I've found three possibilities. Two addresses you've never visited and...Larish."

"You have got to be kidding me," John said. He and Rodney never talked about what had happened on Larish. Keller had done an excellent job on Rodney's nose, and as far as John was concerned, that was the end of it. He really didn't appreciate the reminder.

"I'm afraid not. According to a report from AR-3, there's a library in the Larish temple. It might have some clues...."

"Maybe," John said, cutting him off. "What about the other addresses?"

"One general research station and one weapons research station." He handed over a memory stick. "Here are the addresses and the information from the database."

"Thanks." John tucked the stick into a pocket and leaned back in his chair looking at Rodney. Maybe a little praise was in order; Rodney had, after all, done well. "I mean it; you've done a lot, without much help."

Rodney ducked his head, but John could see the pleased smile on his face. It made him look like he was about twelve, and John grinned and mentally told the door to lock itself.

"What else can I do for you, sir?" Rodney asked, a very different smile on his face. "Just...um, if I can make a request?"

"I know you're hurting, if that's what you're asking," John said. "So what do you want?"

"Let me blow you," Rodney said, sliding off his chair. He went to his hands and knees and crawled over to John.

As he knelt up, John slid his hand down into Rodney's hair, leaned back so Rodney could reach his fly and thought, _this is the fucking life._

* * *

Two days later, John flew the jumper through the gate to M19-984, heading toward the first of the Ancient outposts Rodney had found. Rodney had looked a little wistful as John geared up in their quarters, but he hadn't said anything, and while, after all the training he'd put in, he was probably qualified to go on missions, John had no intention of risking him on something like this.

Neither Ronon nor the Athosians knew anything about the this particular planet, probably because it had a space gate. Keeping the jumper cloaked, John did a quick low orbit while Jeannie manned the scanners.

"Huh...pretty sure there's some Ancient tech down there. I'm getting some faint energy readings," she said. John nodded, he'd seen them on the HUD almost as soon as she'd seen them on the console.

"And...hello," John said. "Human life signs in roughly the same place." He frowned. "Depending on their tech level, these people might not have heard of us. Unless there's another gate down there?"

"Hard to tell," Jeannie said. "It's all a jumble." She frowned. "Wow, there are people all over this planet...it's got one of the biggest populations I've seen since we came to Pegasus."

"Earth population levels?"

"No no, nothing like that. But some of these settlements have several thousand people in them; this big one," she pointed to a bright spot on the HUD, "looks to have twenty-five thousand, maybe even thirty thousand."

"Thank God it's nowhere hear the outpost. Looks like that settlement is pretty small."

"Yeah, about three hundred people or so."

John set up a low geosynchronous orbit above the settlement and then looked at Jeannie. "Okay, aside from the Ancient stuff, what's their tech level?"

"Low," she said. "Looks like they use water and wind power...." She touched a few buttons and brought up the external camera views. "Oh, shit, tell me that isn't a temple type set up?"

"Looks like," Ronon said.

"This is not just a simple temple." Teyla stood up and came forward to point at the display. "Look at the quality of the roads leading into village. And these look like barracks or, more likely, guest housing. This is an important pilgrimage site."

"Well, fuck," John muttered.

"What you said," Ronon said, scowling. "Are we going to have to pretend to be pilgrims again?"

"Either that or come back with some Marines." John was only half joking. Having made up his mind to break from Earth, he wanted to get it over with. Dicking around with libraries and weird-ass native religions was never his idea of a good time, and now he hated wasting the effort.

"If we do this correctly," Teyla said, "this planet could be useful."

"Yeah," Jeannie said. "Their tech level is low, but there are a lot of them. If we end up needing cheap labor...."

"I know," John snapped. "Fine, let's get a closer look, see what kind of weaponry we'll be dealing with."

The answer, somewhat disturbingly, was none. They watched the site for an hour, seeing neither fixed defensive weapons nor personal weapons on any of the villagers. The village itself wasn't even fortified.

"Wonder what they're hiding," Ronon said as John landed the jumper in a ravine roughly ten minutes away from the village.

"Maybe the sheer sanctity of the site protects them," Jeannie suggested sarcastically, tucking her life signs detector into her pocket.

"The temple and its village could be neutral territory," Teyla said.

They'd nearly reached the village before they were noticed by a young woman who was sweeping the small paved area in front of a cottage.

"Oh!" she said, staring at them with wide eyes. "Are you messengers?"

"Travelers," Teyla said. "We wish to visit the temple."

"But it is not the season for pilgrims." The girl looked alarmed and stepped back. "You should see the Elder."

"I think we're about to," John murmured as several people hurried down the lane toward them.

"You are not the usual messengers," a middle-aged man said, frowning nervously at them. Unlike the villagers, who wore comfortable looking pants and tunics, he was dressed in an elaborate robe "Is there...." He paused and clearly tried to calm down. "I am Rathgar, Elder of the Sanctum of Talahar. Please, let us talk in private."

He led them to a comfortable looking courtyard in front of the main temple building. Even as he checked the area for weapons, hidden or overt, John could see the familiar Ancient aesthetic in the coppery metal patterns on the walls and floor of the courtyard.

"You are not the normal messengers and your clothing is unfamiliar. Is there war in the east?"

The east, John remembered, had been the most populated area of the continent, while most of the settlements in the south had been small and scattered. "We don't know," he said. "We're from south of here."

"So you are really here to see the Sanctum?" The Elder had been mostly speaking to John but now, for some reason, he glanced quickly at Teyla and Jeannie and then, when he saw that John was watching him, he looked away.

"Is that so unusual?" Teyla asked. "Sister Jeannie is a mystic of some note, but we have never been able to make the journey until now. Surely her devotions should not have to wait for the proper season?"

John could almost feel Jeannie rolling her eyes, but the Elder looked impressed. "You are her companion?" he asked Teyla.

"Yes. Yes, she is," Jeannie said. "And these two," she gestured dismissively at John and Ronon, "are my bodyguards. You can't be too careful on the road these days."

"Of course, Sister," the man said, bowing so obsequiously to Jeannie that it was John's turn to roll his eyes. "We can begin the purification ceremony as soon as the sun goes down."

"Seeing as we've never been here...."

"What exactly does purification entail?" Teyla asked quickly, talking right over Jeannie. "We have never been to so renowned a sanctum as this."

"We keep only the simplest of rites here. After you dine, we will observe an hour of silent meditation."

This was, John thought, a little too easy.

The rest of the afternoon and evening passed without incident, which did nothing to lessen John's concern. After learning that Jeannie was the only one who had to meditate, he took Ronon aside.

"Why don't you duck out after dinner and see if you can pick up anything from the villagers? Any information at all would be helpful, but you know what to look for."

Dinner was simple--roasted meat and bread served to them by two quiet acolytes. The conversation was limited, but it quickly became clear that the Talaharians worshiped the Ancients. On the surface, that was a good thing; it made it much easier to pretend to have the same religious viewpoints.

On the other hand, John had had to shoot his way out of more than one situation where the locals thought he or Jeannie, or both, were committing blasphemy by imitating an Ancestor. He still hadn't seen any weapons here, so hopefully they could handle it if Jeannie accidentally activated some Ancient device.

Shortly after dinner, Ronon excused himself and no one thought it strange that he wanted to walk for a while. While John could turn on the charm if he needed to, Ronon was better at just standing around while people attempted to fill the silence with chatter and, since he actually seemed to like gathering intel, John was happy to let him do it.

It turned out that Jeannie was supposed to meditate in an anteroom. "Teyla will accompany me," she said, holding her head up regally. The Elder and his acolytes followed them up the stairs and, once they were gone, John took a surreptitious look at his life signs detector, but aside from the party in the anteroom, there was no one in the general sanctum area.

Pouring himself a glass of the fruit juice they'd been served with dinner, John leaned back against one of the walls and started running through escape scenarios in his head.

"Hey," Ronon said, coming back into the courtyard just under an hour later. "Are Jeannie and Teyla still meditating?"

"Yeah, with the Elder and his guys. So it's just you and me." John offered him a glass of juice. "Anything?"

"Teyla was right; this is neutral territory. The chiefs and princes east of here send tribute to keep it that way. There's a whole pilgrimage season and apparently it gets a little crazy around here. The population triples with all the pilgrims and the whores and people selling shit."

"Give me that old time religion," John muttered.

"You believe in anything?" Ronon asked.

Holding up his P-90, John gave him a tight grin. "Might makes right."

"Yeah," Ronon said, with a big grin of his own. "But," he said, giving John a more serious look, "we might need to come up with some kind of tribute."

John just held his gun up again and Ronon nodded.

"Speaking of which," John said, "did you find anything out about their weaponry?"

"The people in the east have some individual guns, really primitive ones. Mostly though, it's spears, swords, bows, and armor. Also, a little bit of larger black powder ordnance." Ronon shrugged. "The villagers here don't have any weapons, so right now, we're good."

"None?"

"No one's attacked the temple in something like seven hundred years. They say the Ancestors protect them."

"Really?" John frowned. He wasn't sure he liked the sound of that. "What about the Wraith?"

Ronon shook his head. "They looked at me like I was talking about _neshik_."

"What?"

"Little winged demon heads that hide under the bed and eat bad children."

"Huh...so Wraith were here long ago, but these later ones don't remember this address." Filing that fact away for prior use, John nodded. "Anything else?"

"They're pretty friendly," Ronon said with a shrug. "Not very suspicious."

Several minutes later, the Elder and Teyla made their way down the stairs of the temple, the acolytes behind them.

"The Sister is very holy," the Elder said, looking impressed. "She wished to be alone in the presence of the Ancestors."

 _Well, that's one possible problem dealt with; if she sets off any tech, they won't be there to see it._

"I did not wish to bring this up in front of the Sister," the Elder began after sitting back down. The acolytes poured everyone more juice and one of them brought out a plate of slightly sweet biscuits that reminded John a little of scones. "However, there is the matter of the tribute."

"What is the usual tribute for such a visit? Our own sanctum is very small and it is primarily supported by our farmers and herders," Teyla said and John couldn't help marveling, yet again, at how good she was at this kind of thing.

"We do not ask for much," the Elder said, spreading his hands. "A few bars of processed gold or, perhaps, a hundredweight of trade tokens?"

"Not much?" Ronon said, raising an eyebrow.

Trying not to roll his eyes, John leaned back and played his usual part in this kind of thing, scowling and resting a hand on his P-90. The Elder shot him the occasional look, but didn't look nearly as worried as John would have liked.

 _They're not armed,_ he reminded himself. _Nothing to worry about._

"I believe we can come to an arrangement," Teyla was saying when John returned his attention to the bargaining. "Of course, we will have to wait for the Sister."

"Oh?"

Teyla managed to sound subtly irritated. "Sister Jeannie keeps a...careful hand on the purse strings."

"You do things very differently in the South."

"Do we?" Teyla looked politely curious and John hid a smirk.

The Elder's smile was a little pained.

Teyla smiled in return, but her right hand was resting on the butt of her Beretta and she tapped it twice.

"Nice place," Ronon said, looking around the courtyard casually. John had already looked and, as far as he could see, not only was there nothing like an arrow slit, there didn't seem to be any defenses. There was a lot of decorative metal work that was obviously Ancient, but that was it.

 _Sitting ducks,_ he thought smugly.

After another hour during which Teyla carefully teased more information from the Elder, John got to his feet, mumbling something about a call of nature. Once he was away from the temple and his life signs detector told him there was no one within listening distance, he tapped his radio.

"McKay?"

"Yeah yeah yeah...what?"

"Good to hear you're still alive," John said dryly. "Any luck?"

"No ZPM," she said with a sigh. "But there's a fair amount of intact data, some of which is going to make your boyfriend happy."

"Yeah, well, how much longer are you going to be in there?"

"Another hour maybe. Why?"

John checked his life signs detector again. "They want money and we don't have any. Can the Elder call down the wrath of the Ancients on us?"

"Hmmm...hang on a sec." She went silent for a long moment and then snorted. "Well, will you look at that. The decorative metal inlay in the courtyard is part of a defense system."

"What's powering it?"

"A crystal generator which I've just taken off line. And before you ask, of course I'll check to make sure there's no back up system or any other surprises they can hit us with."

"Good."

Jeannie's hour turned into two hours and then it was another half hour after that before she finally stepped out of the temple.

"Sister...." the Elder began.

"We're leaving," Jeannie said shortly.

The Elder stared at her, his mouth slightly open in shock. "Most seekers remain with us for days, weeks even."

 _Well, that explains the high tribute they demand,_ John thought as he stood up, hands resting on his P-90.

"I have no reason to stay," Jeannie said. "The Ancestors are not here."

"I assure you, They are." As the Elder spoke, his two acolytes retreated to stand one the stairs to the temple. As the Elder made a gesture, John's P-90 snapped up and Ronon pulled his gun out of its holster.

They all stood that way for a long moment, the Elder looking more and more concerned. He made his gesture again and still nothing happened. "What did you do?" he said turning to glare at Jeannie. "You profaned our sanctum!"

"Your sanctum's an empty room with a few pretty things that don't light up any more." Jeannie looked at John. "C'mon, let's go."

"You will go nowhere, false mystic!" the Elder yelled, making another gesture. Again, nothing happened. "The chiefs of the Eastern tribes and the Princes of the Great Cities will hunt you down and you will die in agony."

The Elder had a pretty good voice, nice and deep and priestly, but John was getting kind of tired of the shouting and it was getting on toward dinner time on Atlantis. Of course, properly cowed, the Elder might be useful later...

"Bring 'em on," he said, turning to aim at one of the acolytes.

Squeezing off a single round was simple and the first acolyte was still falling to the ground when John shot the second one. _Two perfect shots,_ he thought. _They'll find the entry holes in the same place on each guy._

Someone screamed behind John and he turned to see a small form disappear out of view in the gateway of the courtyard. Some kid, probably.

"We'll be leaving now," Jeannie said.

Ronon took point, Teyla and Jeannie behind him.

"Remember us," John said, smiling at the Elder. "We might be back some day."

They didn't have to shoot anyone else all the way out of the village; the few people out this late at night retreated to their houses at the sight of the lights on John, Jeannie and Teyla's P-90s. John had just breathed a sigh of relief when a man carrying a torch stepped out on to the road in front of them.

He was dressed like a farmer and the torch he held danced as if the hand that held it were shaking. "Who...why...."

"We're from the city of the Ancients," John said, sighting down the barrel of his gun. "And why? Because we don't pay tribute to anyone."

He squeezed off another round, and the torch hit the ground as the man screamed and clutched at his arm.

"Well," John said, once they were all settled in the jumper. "Was that a wasted evening, or did you get any decent information?"

"There might be another station here and maybe even a second gate on the ground, but I'll need to go through the data."

"Okay, then, let's blow this place."

* * *

Rodney was in the middle of dinner when John walked into their quarters. "So," he said, looking at John curiously. "Did you...?"

"Shut up and get naked," John snapped and God, but the little flicker of fear that crossed Rodney's face was perfect. John closed his eyes and pressed a hand to the front of his BDUs. "Now!"

When John opened his eyes again, Rodney was going to his knees right in front of him. "You smell like cordite," he said, his hands busy with John's fly.

"Yeah?" John said, his voice already rough. "Shut up and suck me off."

He'd been hard since they'd left the village, and Rodney's mouth around his aching dick was pure heaven. Reaching down, he tangled his fingers into Rodney's hair and pulled him down, waiting for that moment when Rodney started to choke. It came, and John pulled back for a second before he shoved back into Rodney's mouth again.

He did it again and again, keeping Rodney just on the edge of passing out while he did his best to swallow around John's dick. John locked his knees and reached down to press his hand around Rodney's neck. Rodney's moan was ragged and John could feel his throat working hard.

"Take it," John growled although he could barely speak. "Fucking choke on it...oh, fuck!" Not caring if Rodney had enough air, he shoved his hips forward as he came so hard he almost fell. Finally, as Rodney bent over, coughing and gasping for air, John staggered back and sat down hard on the bed.

"C'mere," John said. "Good boy," he said as Rodney crawled across the floor. "Get up here."

"Okay." Rodney sounded like a pack a day smoker and, damn, it was hot, knowing he'd had done that to Rodney. John almost wished he could get hard again and do it all over. Of course, he'd been thinking about fucking Rodney too, so maybe....

"Knees and elbows." John got up, did up his pants and took his tac vest off. He quickly dug through the footlocker of toys until he found what he was looking for--the big plug that drove Rodney crazy. Grabbing the lube off the nightstand, he settled behind Rodney.

"Please...want it so much...."

"You're gonna have to wait," John said. He slicked up his fingers and pushed two of them hard into Rodney's hole. Rodney gave a little gasp, but then shoved back against John's hand and John chuckled and slapped his ass.

"Slut."

"Yeah," Rodney said. John wanted to laugh; even hoarse and breathless Rodney sounded weirdly matter of fact.

Part of the thrill of using toys on Rodney was watching him squirm and work hard to take it, and so John didn't bother much with prep. And sure enough, when he started pushing the plug into Rodney, Rodney slid his knees further apart and wriggled and swore. John kept it up, inch by inch, until Rodney had the whole thing inside him.

"Fuck," Rodney gasped. "Goddamn, that's big."

"You love it."

"I do, but please...."

"No. You just have to wait."

"I know that," Rodney said, sounding almost annoyed. "Please, can you put a cock ring on me? I'm afraid I might.... Please, Sir?"

"Kinky little bastard," John muttered, slapping Rodney's ass again before he dug a cock ring out of the nightstand drawer. Giving Rodney a hard shove, he rolled him over onto his back and grinned at the sight.

Rodney was hard, and there was a slick patch on his belly where the head of his dick rubbed against his skin. After John snapped the ring on, he reached down and pushed the plug in deeper while Rodney wriggled and moaned.

"Hold that thought for a few hours," John said. "I'm hungry."

While he thought about dragging Rodney off to the mess like this, John decided against it and sent for food instead. If he took Rodney to the mess, not only would Rodney have to put on clothes, but people would see him this flushed and turned on--and really, there was a limit as to how much John was willing to share.

"So," he said as they settled down to eat. "We had an afternoon at the improv on the mission today. Your sister got to pretend to be a mystic."

"You're kidding."

"Nope. That station on M19-984 was a fucking temple. Turns out it's a big pilgrimage site, so we did the pilgrim thing."

"And it didn't go well."

"How did you guess?"

Rodney, looking surprisingly like Jeannie for a moment, gave him a look. "Your hands smelled like cordite." He smiled and suddenly looked nothing at all like his sister. "It's hot."

"Me killing people?" John stared at him and Rodney squirmed.

"You coming in here like that...all worked up." Rodney licked his lips. "Like after discipline."

"It was hardly a blood bath," John said with a shrug. "Jeannie disabled the station's defenses and I taught them not to ask us for tribute."

"But no ZPM."

"Nope. Although Jeannie said something about some information she thought you'd be interested in. I'll ask her about it...."

"You don't have to do that," Rodney said.

"Last time you tore apart a whiteboard stand after you had to ask her for something."

Rodney shrugged. "We...it's never gonna be like it was, but we're...we can talk about some things."

"Good," John said, relieved that he wouldn't have to run interference between the McKay siblings. "We'll be checking out that other address in a couple days."

"What about...." Rodney looked down at his plate.

"Larish?" Rodney nodded, still not meeting John's eyes. "Do you want to go back?"

"Me?! I thought Larish was why I don't go on missions."

"You don't go on missions because you're sixteen. Larish...I could walk you naked through the streets and no one would look at you."

His head snapping up, Rodney finally looked at John. "You wouldn't...."

John crossed his arms across his chest and scowled at Rodney and Rodney went silent. "I'll do whatever I damn well like."

"Yes, Sir," Rodney murmured, lowering his eyes again. "I'm sorry, Sir."

"And no, I wouldn't, but you need to remember your place, boy."

"Yes, Sir," Rodney said again, and to John's surprise, he slid down off his chair to kneel at John's feet.

"All the way down," John said.

Rodney's brow furrowed as if he wasn't sure what John meant, but then he bent forward, tucking his knees and arms under himself and putting his forehead to the floor until all John could see was the back of his head, his neck and the smooth expanse of his back.

After staring down at him for a moment, John raised his foot and planted his boot firmly on the back of Rodney's neck. Rodney shivered and made a soft little noise, but otherwise he didn't move. Neither did John; he felt almost frozen in place, struck yet again by the shock of having someone who suited him so well, someone who was utterly and totally _his_.

Finally, he moved his foot and nudged Rodney in the hip with the toe of his boot. "Kneel up."

Rodney was still hard, and his face was flushed again, and somehow John didn't think the plug and the cockring were the only things turning Rodney on.

"You belong to me," John said, his voice husky.

"Yes," Rodney said with an odd little smile. "I do, Sir."

In the middle of the night, John rolled Rodney over, pulled the plug out and slammed into him hard. He came to the sounds of Rodney's desperate begging, thinking, _why did I wait so long to have this?_

* * *

There was a ZPM on P96-553. The planet itself was uninhabited and, for once, the research station was easy to find.

"Goddamnit," Jeannie said in disgust as ZPM rose slowly out of its pedestal. "It's completely drained. The energy readings I got when we came through the gate were for the auxiliary power systems."

"How are those still working when the ZPM is dead?" Ronon asked.

"Either they only kick in when someone scans the place or the ZPM died really recently. Probably the latter." Jeannie shrugged, but wrapped the ZPM up and put it in her pack. "Having a dead one to study could be useful," she said when John raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, well, that's nice but it doesn't help us any in the short term."

There was a long moment of silence while Jeannie checked the stations databanks to see if there was anything useful in them.

"If no one else will say it, I will," Teyla finally said. "We need to check the library on Larish."

"Rodney's got a couple other addresses for us," John began.

"You're so eager to protect him," Jeannie murmured and there was a snide note to her tone that set John off.

"I don't like people touching my things," he snapped. "The fucking Larish should be grateful I didn't do to them what we did to the Genii."

Before anyone could say anything, he turned on his heel and headed for the door. "Get your godamn data so we can leave, McKay."

The research station had been cut into a hillside and now John made his way down to the meadow he'd parked the jumper in. Teyla was right behind him, and finally he turned and glared at her.

"I'm fucking tired of all this dicking around."

"I know," she said. "And if you continue to be this impatient, you are going to make a mistake."

"Really."

"Yes. And what is more, John, you know it as well as I do." She crossed her arm and gave him a steady look. "You are more on edge now than you were before Lorne attempted to take over. Eventually people will notice and wonder why."

"Fine. We'll go to Larish, okay?"

"There is no reason for all of us to go. Jeannie could take Ronon and some of her scientists...."

"No. We'll go and I'll bring Rodney." He rolled his eyes. "It'll be the perfect gesture of good faith."

* * *

On top of it all, when they returned to Atlantis, Elizabeth pulled John aside.

"Colonel, may I speak with you?"

Although he'd been expecting it, John tried not to heave a sullen sigh worthy of Rodney. He doubted she did it on purpose, but Elizabeth really sounded like a schoolteacher at times. Teyla paused on her way back to her quarters, but John shook his head and she kept going. He didn't need her holding his hand.

"Let me guess," he said, sitting down to slouch in a chair opposite her desk. "You want to know why we're shifting missions around."

"No, I want to know why you think we need a ZPM. Or is it Jeannie?" When he didn't say anything right away, she pinched the bridge of her nose. "Fine. If you aren't going to keep me in the loop, why don't you just throw me in a cell?"

"Because that would make you a martyr, and that's the last thing we want."

"John, what _do_ you want?"

"You're not stupid," he said, and as much as he disliked her, that much was still true. "What do you think?"

She leaned back in her chair and looked at him for a long moment. "You've gotten better at this since we got here."

"I've kind of had to."

"What else have you gotten better at?" she asked and John blinked but didn't say anything. "Because when they come for us, it'll be Caldwell or Carter or Ellis or some combination thereof."

"Us," he said, and she smiled slowly.

"You're not stupid, either."

"Maybe you'll think I am. I can't trust you."

She shrugged. "I don't trust you all that much. But be honest with yourself: if I didn't run the administrative side of this city, could you do it?"

"No, but Teyla could."

"Maybe. But how many people would follow her lead? And I know," she held up a hand when he leaned forward, "you don't care. But you should, John."

"So what do you want me to do? Trust you? That's rich; you knew damn well what Lorne and Zelenka were up to and you didn't tell me."

"I'm not asking you to trust me. I'm asking you to consider what I can do for you. I know you've got Jeannie reading everything that goes out of this office back to Earth. Do you have someone watching me as well? Rodney, maybe?"

"Rodney's got better things to keep him busy."

She smiled a little. "I dare say he does."

"Don't even start...."

"I'll accept being under 24/7 surveillance," she said. "If your observers find anything, you can drop me off the East pier."

"Kind of useless if you know you're being watched."

"John, I've assumed I'm being watched for six months now, during which time I haven't done a single thing to undermine your position."

"And we're right back to me needing to trust you."

"Let's just leave it at that, then."

John started to get up and then sat back down. "Tell me," he said. "What do you hope to get out of this?"

"Atlantis was a one way trip for me as much as it was for you or for Jeannie." She looked past him toward the gate. "There's no going back to Earth for me. There never has been."

They sat in silence for a long time, and John could tell she was waiting for him to ask. But really, it didn't matter. He still didn't trust her, but he could use her, and that was enough for now.

"I'll send you the revised schedules," he said, getting to his feet. "I think Rodney will have a few more addresses, and, unfortunately, we need to go to Larish."

"Really?"

"There was a research lab on the planet once, and there's probably some information in their library."

"You mean you've never looked? The Larish collect information; they have an army of scribes taking down everything they can from travelers and they loot libraries on worlds that have been culled. I thought you knew."

"Not until Rodney found mention of it somewhere." He sighed. "Okay, fine, if there's anything else I should know, any information that might lead to a ZPM or Ancient weapons research, send me a memo. And...copy it to Rodney."

"He is a busy boy," she murmured.

John just rolled his eyes and stood up. "Speaking of boys," he said. "at some point soon, probably after we go to Larish, I'll be recalling someone from Bespin. If he thinks you're a contact, you better tell me _everything_ he says."

She leaned forward. "Are you going to interrogate him?"

"Me? Not exactly," John said and then smiled a little. "But he will be questioned. If it's any good, I'll send you a copy."

* * *

"We're going to Larish," Sheppard said as Rodney came out of the shower a few nights later. "Tomorrow."

"We as in the team or we...."

"We as in the team and you."

Rodney tried to ignore the twist in his stomach. Surely Sheppard was right; no one on Larish would be likely to grab at him again. "I have a couple more addresses," he said. "If you give me a little more time...."

"Enough." Sheppard didn't look pleased, and Rodney shut his mouth quickly. Sheppard had been edgier than usual for the last couple of days. Actually, if Rodney was being honest, Sheppard had been on edge ever since he'd talked to his team about breaking from Earth.

"Sorry," Rodney murmured, wondering if he should go down on his knees again.

"It's all right," Sheppard said. He was sitting in bed reading a journal; now he put it down and watched as Rodney finished drying his hair. "You have a right to be nervous, but believe me: nothing is going to happen."

"Why...um, may I ask a question, Sir?"

"Yeah."

"Why am I going? Do you really think I'll be able to find something in the library that Jeannie can't?"

"You've spent enough time on the database, you've probably got a really good eye for gate addresses. Another pair of trained eyes can't hurt."

"Will I have to dress up again?"

"You did look pretty," Sheppard said. "But no. You'll be with us the entire time." He yawned and patted the bed next to him. "C'mon, tomorrow's an early start."

* * *

Larish's seasons matched with Atlantis's and so it was winter on Larish as well; in addition to the Headwoman and her people, the team and their guards were met by servants carrying warm coats edged with soft fur. An honor guard held a large canopy over them until they reached the palace, and Rodney was a little startled at different everything looked covered in a thick blanket of snow.

After Sheppard and Teyla explained why they were there, everyone had to turn around and go back out in the cold as they were led to the temple. Rodney had expected something that looked like a mosque, and so he was surprised to find a simple building that was obviously a lot older than the rest of what he'd seen on Larish.

"You will be the guests of the Matriarch," the Headwoman explained as an older woman wearing plain clothing bowed to them. No one, Rodney noticed with relief, was looking at him.

"Welcome to our Temple," the Matriarch said, looking a little worried. "We have set aside a hall for you, but our people live simple lives."

"That will be acceptable," Teyla said.

"Simple," Sheppard muttered once they were alone in a big, cold room. "Spartan, more like." There was a common area with big pillows for sitting on and a big ceramic stove and then two rows of single beds. It wasn't much, but it was spacious and the beds looked vaguely comfortable; Rodney wasn't sure what Sheppard's problem was. Surely he'd spent time in worse situations.

As Namin made a fire and people claimed beds, Sheppard steered Rodney toward the far end of the hall.

"Okay," Sheppard said. "If we're attacked, you stay back. You try anything heroic and I'll have you up on discipline, you understand?

"Yes, Sir," Rodney murmured. Maybe that was it; maybe the room wasn't very defensible.

* * *

The first day in the temple passed fairly quickly for Rodney. Sheppard had been right--no one so much as looked at Rodney, even the librarians who brought scrolls and books to him were careful around him. It was weird, but Rodney didn't really care, because, God, here he was in an alien library reading moldy old books and scrolls from other planets and how cool was that?

He couldn't read Ancient as well as Jeannie or Teyla or Namin could, but he was mostly working his way through works they'd seen first looking for gate addresses. It was a weird mix of boring and fascinating and Rodney was so focused that their breaks for both lunch and dinner came as a surprise.

That first night was even stranger. Rodney was used to sleeping with Sheppard in a decent sized bed, and he ended up tossing and turning for a good part of the night. He was grumpy the next morning, even though they'd brought coffee with them.

The rest of the second day passed much as the first had. Rodney found several addresses and scanned the documents they were part of for further research back home. While he wasn't exactly expecting to find something labeled "this way to the ZPM," it was still disappointing that he hadn't even seen mention of one.

 _Of course, no one in Pegasus seems to know exactly what a ZPM is,_ he thought. _I'll bet the Ancients didn't go around telling lesser humans about their power systems, even if said lesser mortals could have understood them._

After lunch on the third day, as he was about to return with the others to the library, Sheppard grabbed his arm and pulled him aside. "Didn't you say there was actually a lab here on Larish?"

"I said there might be," Rodney replied.

"Good, let's go look for it."

"But what about...."

"Are you questioning my orders?" Sheppard made a dismissive gesture. "Jeannie said they'll be done by the end of the day, and then, of course, there's a fucking banquet. C'mon."

As they went through the gate to Atlantis, Rodney wondered if Sheppard was antsy for another reason; he'd gone without sex for three days. After all, so had Rodney, and he was feeling it; the moment Sheppard grabbed his arm he'd gotten hard.

But no, Sheppard just took him up to the jumper bay, and a few minutes later, they were heading back though the gate to Larish. After circling the city, Sheppard took the jumper up into orbit.

"So," Rodney said. "What do you look for?"

"Energy readings, mostly," Sheppard said. "Jeannie usually does this part, but it's easy enough." He touched a few keys and then was silent as he read the console and flew the jumper.

Rodney had been up in jumpers a few times since that first time all those months ago and now he remembered Sheppard telling him that it never got old. He'd been right, Rodney thought, watching the stars with eager eyes.

"There we go," Sheppard said. A map came up on the HUD, showing a smallish island almost halfway around the world from the continent the Larish lived on. Sheppard pointed at a bright spot on it. "See that? There's some kind of Ancient tech there."

"We're not going to go check it out, are we?"

"No," Sheppard said. "It's way too dangerous with just two people. The Ancients had a way of booby trapping things. I'll take the team out later; we'll look into it."

He turned in his chair and the HUD disappeared, leaving a clear view of the starfield. "I just had to get out of that fucking library before I died of boredom."

"I kind of enjoyed it," Rodney said. "Although...."

"What?" Sheppard leaned back and looked at him and Rodney smiled.

"I'm afraid all my bruises are fading, Sir."

"Oh, really? We can't have that." Sheppard patted his lap. "Drop your pants and your shorts...."

Sheppard's hand was warm on Rodney's ass as he stroked it. "I'm glad all your pants are too big," he said while Rodney squirmed a little. "Because really, your ass is an invitation to sex."

"Anyone else so much as touches it and I'll shoot them," Rodney said, already a little breathless. Three days without sex and he was already so incredibly turned on; he wasn't sure he could even remember back to when he'd go months with nothing but his own hand.

"Aren't you fierce?" Sheppard murmured, sliding his fingers down the crack of Rodney's ass. Rodney moaned and spread his legs a little, doing his best not to just hump Sheppard's leg. "And fucking greedy too."

"Please?" Rodney asked, shivering as Sheppard kept his touch light. "Please, Sir?"

The faint pressure of Sheppard's fingers on his skin was enough of a warning; Rodney braced himself as Sheppard pinched him _hard_ , high on the inside of his thigh. Rodney yelped and twisted on Sheppard's lap.

"Thought you wanted bruises," Sheppard said. Before Rodney could say anything, the pain came again as Sheppard pinched up another bit of skin and twisted. "Hurts, doesn't it?"

"It does," Rodney gasped out. "God...hurts so much...more?"

"Fuck," Sheppard snarled as he did it again. "That's my boy." He pinched Rodney again and then again and then, just when Rodney really started to shake and try to get away, he stopped.

"As soon as we have a night at home, I'm going to tie you down and go down there and bite those marks until they're swollen and dark and purple and hurt every time I brush a finger over them." He chuckled and ran a hand over Rodney's ass. "Now, however...."

It didn't matter that Rodney was expecting it, he still cried out loudly when Sheppard's hand landed on his ass. Sheppard wasn't holding anything back and his hand slammed down on Rodney's ass over and over in a hard fast rhythm that hurt like fuck.

"Go on boy...tell me you want it," Sheppard growled.

"I do...please please Sir...love it when you spank me."

"Yeah?"

"God, yes," Rodney said, lifting his ass in time with Sheppard's blows. It hurt like crazy, possibly because every time he moved, the bruises Sheppard had pinched up on his thighs twinged, and Rodney was a little surprised at how close to tears he was.

He tried then, tried to bring them on, thinking about how afraid he'd been to go back to Larish, how frightened he been last time they'd been there.... With a soft little hiccup, he finally started crying, and if Sheppard wanted to think it was because of the spanking, then fine. But really, this wasn't for Sheppard, this was for Rodney himself, because _he_ needed it.

"Good boy," Sheppard said, spanking him again and again. "That's my good boy...."

"Please," Rodney gasped out. "Please please please fuck me...."

Sheppard's fingers were wet when he shoved two of them into Rodney, but Rodney knew it was just spit and that it would hurt when Sheppard actually fucked him.

He was right--it burned like hell when he finally straddled Sheppard's lap and sank down on his dick--but Rodney didn't care at all; he _wanted_ it to hurt, _needed_ it to. He rode Sheppard hard and for the first time he really felt like he was using Sheppard to get rid of his own stress and anxiety.

It was a dangerous line of thought, but fortunately, Sheppard was busy getting off on Rodney's tears; he slid a hand up into Rodney's hair and pulled him down so he could lick at Rodney's face. It was strange, but somewhere along the line Rodney had gotten used to it, and now it was even a little comforting.

"Go on," Sheppard murmured, his lips rough against Rodney's cheek. "Come for me." And that was weird too--the way those words from that voice did it for Rodney; he moved down on Sheppard's cock and came hard, his whole body shaking with it.

Sheppard must have been a little stressed, too; Rodney was still shuddering through the aftershocks when Sheppard grabbed his hips and came, his mouth moving on Rodney's face. It was shockingly intimate and close and when Rodney wrapped his arms around Sheppard and just hung on, Sheppard let him.

Much later, after they'd tidied up and were preparing to return to the city, Sheppard gave him a long look.

"Do I have come on my pants?" Rodney asked, pretty sure he didn't.

Sheppard snorted. "No. I just wanted to warn you. When we're done with the Larish mission, I'm having them recall that kid."

"Oh."

"Don't sweat it," Sheppard said dryly. "I'm going to let you have him."

Blinking, Rodney tried to make sense of that. "What?"

"I told you I want you to question him."

"Well, yeah, but...do you mean what I think you do, Sir?"

"Don't tell me you've never wanted to fuck someone."

"I did," Rodney said. "There was this girl in school...April, her name was. She needed help with an assignment, so we made a deal."

"A guy."

Rodney shrugged. "I got blown a few times, but I was usually more interested in finding some guy who would fuck me."

Leaning back in his chair, Sheppard looked at him. "An older guy?"

"Well, yeah. The guys at school mostly wanted to beat me up, and at the time I didn't think that was such a good idea." He laughed. "In retrospect, it wouldn't have been such a good idea."

"Oh?"

"I'm sure you could actually beat me with your fists and make me like it, but those boys? No thanks."

"Well here's your chance to get something back," Sheppard said, and then turned to the jumper controls, leaving Rodney to wonder if that's how it had started for Sheppard.

It actually made a kind of sense; for all that he was rangy and tall and pretty damn buff for someone over forty, Sheppard wasn't all that big. He'd probably been kind of skinny as a kid and even going to whatever exclusive prep school he'd attended wouldn't have kept him from getting bullied. In Rodney's case, explosives had been his answer to bullies; in Sheppard's case? He'd probably just learned to beat the crap out of people.

 _And then maybe even fuck them?_

It was a disturbingly hot image--Sheppard fucking some prep school jerk, maybe with the other boy tied up and gagged and hating it. And fine, maybe, just maybe, Rodney could see himself doing that.

Rodney was very quiet on the flight back to Atlantis.

* * *

The Larish banquet that evening was good for one thing: Ellah danced. After, Rodney beckoned her over and she came and knelt down next to him, bowing so low to Sheppard that her head touched the ground.

"I'm so glad to see you," she said very quietly. "With everything that happened...we were afraid for weeks."

"Did you know about the coup attempt?"

"We heard there had been shooting near the gate, but everyone inside the palace was in an uproar and so no one really paid much attention to what was going on outside. Some of Warleader Kamil's people tried to rescue her because they thought the Headwoman had come up with an excuse to depose her."

"Really?"

She nodded. "That's why the Headwoman had her executed. Of course, when she told people what Kamil had done, and even some of the Opposition who had been at the banquet confirmed it, the troops calmed down. No one wants to anger Colonel Sheppard; I don't know why someone tried to overthrow him."

"They didn't get very far," Rodney said. It was weird to remember it now, the way it had all hinged on him. Or maybe it hadn't; Sheppard probably could have gotten out of it somehow. At the time, however, it had _seemed_ that only Rodney could free him.

The choice had been amazingly easy to make.

"No," Ellah said. "We were shown what happened to Major Lorne and his allies." She shivered a little and glanced at Sheppard, who was talking quietly to Ronon.

"So," Rodney said, in an effort to lighten things up a little. "How's your plan for freedom coming along?"

She smiled and almost bounced in place. "I have a patron, and in a way, it's thanks to you."

"Oh?"

She gestured toward slim woman in familiar looking armor at a table across the room. "Warleader Ilish. She doesn't like men at all, even pretty ones like you."

Rodney rolled his eyes. "Obviously, she has excellent taste in girls."

"Clearly." Ellah laughed. "She buys jewelry and clothes for me and I dance at her banquets."

"How does that work? Can she just buy you?"

"She could, but I think she's courting me."

"Do you like her?"

Ellah paused and thought about it. "I think I do. And even if I didn't, the Headwoman only keeps me for her guests. Warleader Ilish has a great deal of power and influence. And...." She glanced around and then leaned in close to whisper in Rodney's ear. "She likes me to tie her up, can you imagine?"

"Oh, I think I can. From the other side, of course."

"She gave me a pillow book about it; it's very beautiful even if it's mostly pictures of men."

After glancing at Sheppard, Rodney looked at Ellah thoughtfully. "Do you think I could buy a copy of it?"

"I imagine so. I could find out how much it would cost, and perhaps in the next trading mission, a deal could be worked out."

"I'll talk to Teyla about it," Rodney said.

"I would like to correspond with you, if Colonel Sheppard would allow it."

Having his own connection on Larish might not be a bad thing, Rodney thought. Particularly someone who was close to both the Warleader and the Headwoman's household. That Ellah was probably thinking roughly the same thing was fine with Rodney.

"I'd like that," he said.

There was a lull in the conversation between Sheppard and Ronon, and to Rodney's surprise, Ellah leaned forward and very deftly got Sheppard's attention.

"Who are you?"

"This is Ellah, Sir. She's the girl who did me up last time," Rodney said.

"Okay," Sheppard said. "What can I do for you?"

"I just wanted to give Rodney a hug, Colonel."

Rodney's face went hot and Sheppard smirked. "Feel free," he said.

Ellah smelled good--it was one of the scents Rodney had rejected when he'd been here before--and she rubbed her cheek against Rodney's for a brief moment before pulling back. "I should go."

"Take care," Rodney said.

"Nice," Ronon said, watching her walk away.

"Don't poach Rodney's _girlfriend_ ," Jeannie said, elbowing Ronon in the ribs. "Not if you know what's good for you."

* * *

"What was all that on Larish?" Sheppard asked, much later that night, after they'd returned to Atlantis. He didn't sound too upset so Rodney just shrugged.

"She's one of the Headwoman's slaves, but the new Warleader likes her a lot. She wanted to know if we could communicate. If it's okay with you."

"Do you want her?" Sheppard asked with a smirk.

"What? No." Rodney shook his head. "Not hardly. I just thought it might be nice to have a contact who was outside of any deals Teyla or Dr. Weir make."

"Not a bad idea. Talk to Teyla about it; she handles some of the contact with the Larish. I'm sure she could set something up with your little pen pal."

Rodney rolled his eyes and Sheppard just laughed.

The next morning as they were finishing breakfast, Rodney leaned toward Teyla. "May I speak to you about some trading?" he asked.

"Of course, Rodney. Walk with me to my rooms."

Rodney had never been to Teyla's suite before; it was larger than Sheppard's, with what looked like a real living room. She waved to one of the couches and settled on the other. "You wish to trade with the young lady on Larish?"

"Yeah. She told me about this book...um, it's a pillow book. I wanted to get a copy and maybe give it to Colonel Sheppard." Rodney tried to ignore the blush he knew was covering his face. "I just don't know what we trade or if I even have...um, any money or shares or whatever."

"You are in an unusual situation," she said. "You have a department that does not show up on anyone's books and does not have a budget. Dr. Mullins is still part of Sciences and Corporal Philips is still on the military payroll."

Rodney was suddenly struck by a thought. "About that--does Namin actually get paid? And if he does, can I get him a raise or a bonus or something? Because he's not just standing around protecting me any more."

"I pay my people in trade markers, and yes, he gets more than Rath does. In fact, I have been considering talking to John about giving you another day time bodyguard, but you would probably put them to work as well."

"Only if I trusted them."

She nodded. "It is something to think about. As for you--you have never needed a salary and have never attempted to trade, but I see no problem in making this small trade on your behalf. I will, however, speak to John and Elizabeth about setting up a trading account for you."

"Thank you," Rodney said, and wow, this was kind of cool.

"I also wanted to know if there was a way for me to correspond with Ellah on Larish," he added.

Before he could explain why, Teyla nodded. "I am in communication with the Headwoman's servant, Tashin. She is a good contact, but I believe it would be wise for us to have someone in the Warleader's household as well. If you write a letter, I will see that it is delivered and that you get the reply."

"Thank you, Ma'am," Rodney said again. "I really do appreciate it. If there's anything I can do for you...."

"You already have. I was worried about what we were going to do with Namin, and you have given him a place."

"Well, he's pretty smart," Rodney said. "I'm lucky to have him."

* * *

Two days later, Rodney was in his lab making his way through the information Jeannie brought back from the Sanctum on M19-984. It really had been a weapons research outpost, and it seemed they'd even been working on drone research. Rodney was riveted to his console, desperately hoping he'd find something that would lead him to the drone plant he was _sure_ existed somewhere on Atlantis.

 _If only if I could find a freakin' city map._ But then again, no one had ever found a map of the city; along with ZPMs it was the closest thing the Expedition had to the Holy Grail. If Rodney could find it, Sheppard would...well, he'd probably beat Rodney in celebration, but still, it'd be a better present than the Larish bondage book.

Behind him, Philips and Mullins were settling in for the day; while normally Rodney would ignore them, today they were quieter than usual.

"Do you think," Philips began, and then trailed off when he realized Rodney was paying attention to him.

"What's up?"

"Oh...nothing...." Phillips said.

Rodney folded his arms and glared at both of them. "You know, if I find out that there is something going on and you didn't tell me about it, I'm not going to be happy."

"Um...."

"Oh, for God's sake, stop stammering," Mullins said, turning her back on Phillips. "A couple of the people sent to the mines have been called back, including that pretty boy."

"Don't you all have something better to do than gossip?" Rodney snapped, turning back to his console. He settled in, hunching his shoulders a little. He'd told Sheppard that he wouldn't be pretending, but now he thought about the conversations they'd had since then and thought that maybe, just maybe, he trusted Sheppard.

Oh, sure, Sheppard might fuck Alexander, but he was pretty sure Alexander wouldn't replace Rodney in Sheppard's life.

 _Pretty sure,_ Rodney thought, resisting the temptation to spy on Sheppard. He wasn't entirely certain the city would let him do it without notifying Sheppard in some way, and that was a confrontation he didn't want to have.

 _Try to trust him,_ Rodney told himself. _He trusts you these days._

Still, he was irritable for the rest of the morning, and it wasn't entirely an act. It didn't help when he went to the range that afternoon; the conversation trailed off as he came into the room, and it was hard to pretend he didn't know what they'd all been talking about.

He didn't let it affect his shooting. In fact, he went for it, shooting round after round until his target was one big hole, and then he reeled the target in and set up another one. It helped more than he expected, and by the time he'd shot the hell out of the second target he was feeling a lot better.

"Nice shooting," Corporal Baumgarten said as Rodney pulled off his ear protection and stepped back.

"It's been a day," Rodney said, looking around. "Not that I'm complaining, mind you."

"You never complain," one of the Marines, a big guy named Mike, said.

"You've obviously mistaken me for someone else," Rodney replied, sitting down to clean his gun. "I bitch all the time."

"Everyone does that," Baumgarten said, reaching for her water bottle. "You don't sweat the big stuff."

Rodney shrugged. "Not much I can do about it."

"This is Atlantis," she said, softly enough that he could barely hear her. "Accidents happen all the time."

Keeping his head down, Rodney smirked just a little and remained silent.

* * *

"So," Sheppard said, shoving Rodney up against the wall as soon as they reached their quarters after dinner. "How many people told you that Alexander was in my office today?"

"Mullins mentioned it; the guys on the range were obviously talking about it, although not where I could hear, and I got an anonymous email from one of Keller's nurses, of all people," Rodney replied, a little breathless because Sheppard was pushing his leg between Rodney's thighs. "Did you fuck him?"

"You sound like you'd think it was hot." Sheppard pressed harder and Rodney moaned. "You want to see that, boy?"

"I dunno," Rodney said, giving up and grinding against Sheppard's thigh the way Sheppard wanted him to. "Maybe if you hurt him...." And weirdly enough, the thought was kind of hot. _But only,_ he thought, _if Alexander hated it._

"You little pervert," Sheppard said with a hoarse laugh. He slide a hand up under Rodney's t-shirt and twisted one of his nipple rings.

"I'm what you...ohhhh...made me." The words escaped before Rodney could help and he froze.

Sheppard leaned back a little and looked at him. "I find that hard to believe."

"I...." Rodney leaned his head against the wall with a thunk. "I never thought about it before," he finally said. "I hated plenty of people, but...."

"You just killed them or blew their shit up." Sheppard tweaked Rodney's nipple again. "But now you want to see people hurting?"

"Some people," Rodney said, raising his chin. "I'm not like...I don't want it all the time, or with you, or anything like that. I don't even know if it's about sex for me."

"You know that if you go after anyone without my permission...."

"I'm not...of course not, Sir."

Sheppard pushed his leg up again and twisted the nipple ring. "You're not what?"

"Stupid," Rodney said. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be disrespectful."

To Rodney's relief, Sheppard just laughed. "No, you're not stupid. And I'm done talking about Alexander." He put his other hand on Rodney's hip and tugged a little. "C'mon, boy, do it."

Rodney obeyed, feeling his face go hot. Even as he rubbed off against Sheppard's leg, he wondered if he'd ever get over the faint humiliation he felt when Sheppard did things like this. _Then again, maybe I don't want to._ Because if he was being honest with himself, he _liked_ feeling that little twist of hot embarrassment in his stomach whenever Sheppard made him do something humiliating.

 _Maybe I really_ am _a pervert._

"After you come," Sheppard said, leaning in close so that his breath was hot on Rodney's cheek, "I'm going to fuck you until you come again."

Some day, Rodney hoped, his hormones would settle down and he wouldn't have this fucking hair trigger. Today, however...he moaned loudly and shoved against Sheppard's thigh until his dick ached. It was more than enough, and he came hard.

Sheppard actually gave him a moment to catch his breath, but even before he made a move, Rodney was going to his knees and reaching for Sheppard's fly.

"Thought I said I wanted to fuck you," Sheppard said, bracing a hand against the wall as Rodney licked at his cock.

"Just getting you wet enough," Rodney mumbled.

"Fuck!" Sheppard's hips snapped forward as Rodney slid his mouth down over Sheppard's dick. He kept it sloppy, but Sheppard didn't seem to care, and for a moment Rodney wondered if Sheppard would change his mind and just come down Rodney's throat.

But no; when Rodney pulled back and looked up, Sheppard grinned down at him. "Get that ass in the air, boy."

"Yes, Sir," Rodney said, undoing his pants. He wrinkled his nose a little as he shoved them and his damp boxers down around his thighs, but a moment later, as Sheppard's cock pushed into him, hard, sticky underwear wasn't that big a deal.

It hurt, of course, but it was a familiar pain and Rodney welcomed it. Sheppard was fucking him hard and fast and Rodney was pretty sure that meant he hadn't gotten off earlier in the day. While Sheppard was more than capable of getting it up two or even three times a day, he tended to be a little more inventive and a lot less hurried the second or third time around.

Sheppard rested his hand on the back of Rodney's collar, pressing down hard. "Mine," he growled as Rodney moaned and pushed back against Sheppard's thrusts. The position pressed his cheek against the floor and his neck hurt and, of course Rodney was hard again. All of it, everything they did, came down to this--Sheppard fucking him, claiming him. And yes, Rodney loved it, _needed_ it.

"Go on, boy," Sheppard snarled, sounding almost desperate. "Come for me."

"Yours," Rodney gasped out as he came. "All...yours...."

"Fuck...mine!"

Much later, when the lights were out and they had settled in bed, Sheppard slid a hand up Rodney's chest to the collar.

"Give it a few more days," he said, his fingers brushing Rodney's neck as he toyed with the smooth leather. "I'm going to look smug, but since I'm not actually fucking the kid, you're going to have to make it up to me."

"Such a hardship," Rodney murmured, and Sheppard chuckled.

* * *

The next few days were pretty awful. No one came out and told Rodney that both Sheppard and Alexander were spending a lot of time holed up in Sheppard's office, but he received several emails and just _happened_ to overhear people talking about it.

He wasn't sure what was worse, ignorant fools sending emails that were anything but anonymous or the people he overheard. The people emailing him meant well, but anyone who thought Rodney couldn't find out where an anonymous email came from was too stupid to be of much use to him as an ally. On the other hand, the people gossiping where he could hear them usually sounded pleased that he was being replaced.

Rodney said nothing about either group to anyone, but he started keeping a couple of lists in the back of his mind and on the small, hidden database he'd set up inside the Ancient systems. Someday he'd need to know who was on his side and who wasn't.

He was a little surprised how annoyed he was with the fact no one blamed Sheppard for fooling around with a new boy. But it was only to be expected; even if people had issues with Sheppard, not only were they not going to badmouth him around Rodney, but, these days, they weren't going to badmouth him around _anyone._

So Rodney kept his head down and, in addition to working on his various projects, he did a little scouting around the city using the internal security systems. Once he'd found the perfect spot, he made his plans and then, smiling a satisfied smile, went back to work.

"Now," he told Sheppard early one morning. "I'm going to skip my run and go after him now, while you're off with Ronon."

Sheppard took a deep breath and then ran a hand across Rodney's cheek. "Where are you going to do this?"

"There's a place, an abandoned med lab," Rodney explained, leaning into Sheppard's touch. "I set up the security cameras to record everything that happens there."

"Good boy." Sheppard paused and then gestured at the footlocker. "Take what you need."

"Thank you, Sir." Rodney turned his head and kissed Sheppard's hand. Sheppard slapped him lightly and then took off for his run.

Rodney hadn't counted on being able to use any of Sheppard's things, and now he looked at the top of the footlocker, not sure he wanted to open it. It had never been locked, but   
he'd been told to keep out of it, and although it wasn't easy, he'd never let his curiosity get him into trouble. Shaking his head, he left the footlocker alone. He didn't want any of the things Sheppard used on him to be mixed up in this.

Alexander had been given a small room in the hall near Sheppard's office. This early, there was no one around as Rodney and Namin approached the door.

"Rodney," Namin said quietly, once he realized where they were going. "Are you really going to do this? Won't Colonel Sheppard be...."

"I know what I'm doing," Rodney said firmly. He thought about explaining things to Namin, but no. Rodney had no idea if anyone was watching this corridor, but if he were spying on Sheppard, this was one of the places he'd monitor.

Alexander turned out to be a light sleeper; he sat up in bed as the door closed behind Rodney. "What...?"

"Shut the fuck up," Rodney snarled, stalking over to the bed. Alexander's eyes went wide as he realized just who'd woken him up.

"I didn't...he hasn't...."

Rodney reached out and slapped him hard. "I'm going to say this once, so pay attention. If I tell you to do something, you do it. If you don't...." He smiled tightly. "Now throw on some clothes and come on."

He had to slap Alexander a few more times before they could finally head out and Namin all but dragged Alexander down the hall to the transporter. Rodney checked his lifesigns detector over and over, but no one saw them and he breathed a sigh of relief once the transporter doors closed. On one hand, he kind of wanted it to get around that he'd dealt with Alexander. On the other hand, if Alexander had a contact in the city, the last thing Rodney wanted to do was pique their interest.

The moment the door to the old lab closed behind them, Alexander started talking again. "Look," he said. "I promise...he wouldn't let me do anything....he hasn't touched me!"

"I know," Rodney said. He pointed at an examination table. "Put him on that, face down for now, and use the cuffs."

"No, wait...what?!" Alexander yelled as Namin wrestled him into position.

"Good," Rodney said, once Alexander was secure.

Putting a hand on Namin's arm, Rodney led him to a corner so they could speak without Alexander hearing them. "First of all, relax," he said. "Colonel Sheppard knows what's going on and he's okay with it. He'll probably be along in a little while."

"Why is he having you do it?"

"I don't ask him questions like that," Rodney said. He knew why, of course. Or at least he thought he did. Part of it had to do with Sheppard's campaign to toughen him up. It was a weird thought, and he still wasn't sure what to make of it. The rest of it was about the sex; Rodney wondered if this was some kind of test to see if Rodney got off on it the way Sheppard did.

 _I wonder what a win would be--liking it or not?_

"Anyway," he continued. "I'm going to ask him some questions, find out who he was supposed to report to."

"Okay," Namin said, and Rodney gripped him on the shoulder, knowing that Namin would probably have said "okay" if Rodney had said he was doing this without Sheppard's permission.

"So," he said, moving back over to the examination table. "You're telling me Sheppard hasn't laid a hand on you?"

"He hasn't, I swear it!"

"And you were sent to Atlantis...why?"

"I'm part of the resistance."

Rodney snorted. "I very much doubt that," he said. "I think you're a spy and I think you're here to seduce Colonel Sheppard."

"I'm not! I wasn't...."

"Do you know what your superiors back on Earth let you in for?" Rodney pulled his utility knife from its sheath.

Alexander's clothes were thin in places and Rodney wondered if he had more than one set to wear. _Oh well,_ he thought and sliced his way up one leg and then the other. He was pleased that he'd managed to cut Alexander's jeans and his underwear off without so much as scratching his skin.

"Did they tell you that the colonel likes pretty boys?" Rodney smacked Alexander's ass with the flat of his blade. "Did they tell you what he does to them?"

"No one told me anything!"

"I could show you," Rodney said. "You know, give you a few friendly pointers."

"Why are you doing this?"

Rodney smiled, remembering Sheppard's reply to that question back when Rodney was first on Atlantis.

 _"Because I can. Because I want to. Because you're young and pretty and terrified. Because I can tell how much you want it."_

He was pretty sure Alexander didn't want this, but, honestly, the fact that Alexander was young and pretty didn't mean that much to Rodney.

"Because I can," he said. "Because I want to."

"You don't have to...I haven't done anything."

"My parents were part of a resistance group," Rodney said casually as he put the knife back in its sheath. "They died in a mysterious car accident." He paused, undoing his belt and pulling it out of the loops on his jeans. The knife went on a nearby equipment cart and Rodney folded the belt over. "I'd turned them in, of course."

He snapped the belt and Alexander tensed. "So you see, as far as I'm concerned, you don't have to have done anything other than that. Although I'm pretty sure you were never in a resistance cell or group."

Taking a deep breath, he slammed the doubled over belt down onto Alexander's ass. "This is what they let you in for," he said and did it again.

"Ow! Fuck!"

"Don't be a baby. This is an average night in Colonel Sheppard's quarters." As he spoke he beat Alexander in time with his words. "Dinner, a little chess and then some ass beating."

He fell silent after that; Alexander was yelling and twisting in the restraints, but Rodney knew damn well that he wasn't going to get anything out of him like this. Even if Alexander was just an untrained kid and not an actual State spy, this was nothing.

 _Well,_ Rodney thought as he brought the belt down again. _Not nothing, because I can sure as hell chalk this up to a learning experience._ What he'd learned was that he wasn't actually turned on by this. It felt good in a way, it made him feel a little less jealous, but it wasn't hot, even when he started leaving welts.

He finally stopped when Alexander's yells turned into a soft hitching noise. When Rodney realized what he was hearing--he'd made Alexander cry--he waited for some kind of feeling. But whatever it was that got Sheppard off, whatever made his eyes go dark and his face soften just a little when Rodney cried, didn't seem to be present in Rodney.

 _So that's that, then. I'm not a sadist._

"If I were Sheppard," he said, going to the head of the table, "you'd soon be crying for a different reason."

 _Of course, if I were Sheppard, I'd also be really distracted._

"Anyway, I'm not at all convinced that those tears of yours are real," he continued.

"Fuck you," Alexander snarled. "You hurt me and made me fucking cry and now you...."

Rodney reached out and patted his damp cheek. "Oh trust me, I know it hurts. I didn't do anything to you that hasn't been done to me. Yet," he added, thinking about the Ancient taser in his pocket. He'd grabbed it out of the armory, but, while he wasn't supposed to have one, he didn't think Sheppard would mind.

"I just don't think it's that big a deal to you. If I were looking for someone to distract Colonel Sheppard, I'd pick a boy with a high pain threshold and good acting skills."

"I'm not a spy," Alexander said and Rodney laughed.

"Bullshit." He slammed the belt down another dozen times, while Alexander cried and twisted in the restraints. "The question is...do you really have what it takes to distract the colonel?"

He glanced over at Namin as he put his belt down on the equipment cart. "Time to flip him over and find out."

With Namin's help, he got Alexander's shirt off and then they strapped him to the table again.

"Huh, thought so," Rodney said with a dismissive glance at Alexander's crotch; he wasn't hard, but then, Rodney hadn't expected him to be. The really interesting thing was that Alexander wasn't blushing even though he was stretched out naked in front of someone who wanted to hurt him.

Frowning, Rodney spent a long moment looking at Alexander's face. Alexander stared back defiantly, but it wasn't his expression Rodney was concerned with. The more he looked at Alexander the more he reminded Rodney of the actor who played Erin McCall's brother on _Security Watch_. Terry McCall was supposed to be your average teenager, but Rodney remembered reading that the guy who played him--Tom somebody? something with a W?--was in his mid-20s.

The more Rodney looked at Alexander, the more he was convinced he was looking at someone a good ten years older than Rodney himself was.

"How old are you?"

"Sixteen," Alexander said and it sounded natural but then if he was a spy, he'd be good at this kind of thing.

"Really?" Rodney said, skeptically. He paused and then shrugged. "If you say so.... Now, where were we?"

"You were going to let me go," Alexander said. "I can't believe you think you'll get away with this."

"Really?" Rodney grabbed his knife, flicking the sheath off easily. "I could cut your fucking throat and no one would do a thing. Not that I will, of course. I still have some questions."

"I don't know anything!" Alexander's eyes were green and they were wide; he was probably hoping to convince Rodney that he was afraid. "And I swear...the colonel hasn't touched me!"

"You don't need to keep saying that," Rodney said, trailing the point of his knife down Alexander's chest from his neck to his navel. "I know damn well he hasn't laid a hand on you. Which means, sadly, that you kind of suck at your job."

The point of the knife moved back up, leaving a white line that turned to red as Rodney watched it.

"I can't imagine the people back on Earth are going to be very pleased with you now." Rodney snorted. "They screwed up, you know. They were going off what...something the late, unlamented Major Lorne told them? That the colonel likes boys who are fragile? Boys that aren't perverts?"

"I don't know anything about what the colonel likes."

"More bullshit," Rodney said. He pressed harder this time, watching with curiosity as small beads of blood welled up in the wake of the knife point.

"Don't!"

"Oh, stop it!" Rodney snapped. "I'm not buying that big-eyed scared look any more than Sheppard would."

"I don't know what you want," Alexander said, tears leaking from the corner of his eyes.

 _God, he cries easily. Good thing Sheppard doesn't know about that._

"I want to know who sent you and who you were supposed to report to here on Atlantis."

"I'm not...."

Rodney put the knife aside and slapped Alexander hard and then backhanded him even harder. It was enough to split Alexander's lip and Rodney was pretty sure he'd have bruises to show for it. Surprised at his own strength, he did it again and then again. "You don't really have much aside from the ability to take pain and to look like you're sixteen."

He rubbed his own nose, feeling the minuscule bump in it. "I could break your nose," he said, conversationally. "I could carve your pretty face up until all anyone saw were the scars."

For the first time, he saw a glint of what looked like genuine fear in Alexander's eyes.

"But no, I don't think that would get me what I'm looking for. You're obviously worried about your looks, but I'm really going to need to hurt you to get real results."

He slammed the knife down hard, driving it into the padded examination table less than two centimeters away from Alexander's neck. Alexander hardly flinched and Rodney smiled just a little.

 _I'd have been terrified if someone did that to me, but he knows I'm not going to kill him right off. Totally a spy._ He turned away for a moment, aware that he wasn't doing the best job. _It's not like Sheppard and Ronon have given me classes in Torture...no, Questioning 101._

Turning back to the table, he held up the taser. "My sister's scientists have a choice when it comes to punishment. They can take a military beating or they can have this. They usually take this, probably because Colonel Sheppard would be the one delivering the flogging, and trust me, he's really good at it."

"What is it?" Alexander looked at it nervously.

Rodney had read the specs of the taser and he'd spent some time getting used to its controls. Now he dialed it to deliver moderate pain and pressed it hard against Alexander's closest bicep. The result was more than satisfactory; Alexander yelled and arched against the restraints.

"Now we're getting somewhere," Rodney murmured and dialed it up a little higher. This time, he jabbed it against Alexander's hip, and this time, Alexander actually let out a scream. "Apparently it hurts more if I use it against a less padded part of your body." He held it up, making a production of dialing it up again.

"Hit him with it two more times," a voice said in his headset and Rodney nearly jumped out of his skin. It was Sheppard, but still, Rodney felt his heart pound in his chest. "Don't dial it up any more."

To cover up his surprise, he pressed the taser to the thin, pale inside of Alexander's elbow and held it there while Alexander screamed and writhed.

 _Now we're getting somewhere,_ Rodney thought. He still wasn't turned on, but he wasn't upset, either. _I can do this; I just need to learn how to be more effective at it._

He chose Alexander's ribs next; Alexander was skinny and had fewer muscles on his chest than Rodney did these days. Judging from the sounds he made, the taser hurt like hell and Rodney was glad he'd never been on the wrong end of it. He was pretty sure even his own weird brain chemistry wouldn't be able to make him like it.

"So," he said, stepping back a little. "How old are you?"

"Sixteen." Alexander's voice was raspy now but he didn't look defeated in any way.

"Look," Rodney began. "We both know...."

Behind him, the door opened.

"Colonel!" Alexander said, sounding much more afraid and helpless than he had a second ago. "Please...you have to...."

Rodney laughed.

"Something funny?" Sheppard asked.

"Did they even brief him on you? Because I'm pretty sure telling you that you have to do something isn't a good call."

"No, it really isn't." Sheppard smirked. "How you doing, Rodney?"

"Only so so, Sir," Rodney said. "I'm going to need some pointers if you want me to keep doing this."

"Wait," Alexander said. "You knew?"

"Of course I did," Sheppard said. "One more thing your handlers got wrong; I don't like stupid people. You should have guessed right away that Rodney was doing this with my permission."

He turned to Rodney. "Nice call on the age thing; I was wondering if you'd notice."

"Thank you, Sir," Rodney said. He held the taser out to Sheppard. "Now that you're here...."

"Nope," Sheppard said. "You said you needed pointers, didn't you? Might as well make this a learning experience."

He bent down and murmured in Rodney's ear. "Is this turning you on?"

"No, Sir," Rodney said softly.

"Huh." Sheppard pulled away and straightened up. "You did read the specs on that thing, didn't you?"

"Yes, Sir."

"You see," Sheppard said, turning back to Alexander. "The Ancients were pretty good at the whole technology thing. Rodney's little toy won't stop your heart, even turned all the way up. It will, however, do some excruciating nerve damage."

"There's no reason to do this," Alexander said. "You're going to kill me eventually, so why should I tell you anything?"

"Thus proving that you have something to tell," Sheppard said. "And you know, we don't have to kill you. We can hurt you and then send you through the gate to an empty planet and let you make your way or die there. Or give you to one of the slave dealers we know. Or, for that matter, I'm sure the genetics department here on Atlantis could use a new test subject."

Alexander's eyes went wide and Sheppard turned to Rodney. "Bump it up one notch and use it on the sole of his foot."

"No!" Alexander shouted. Rodney ignored him and pressed the taser to the bottom of his foot, wincing when Alexander shrieked.

 _God, he's loud._

"At some point, I'll have Ronon teach you some real techniques," Sheppard said. "He's better at it than I am. Less easily distracted, if you know what I mean."

Rodney knew exactly what he meant, and it was hard to keep his eyes on Sheppard's face when he wanted to know if this was turning Sheppard on.

"In fact, that might be what we do with him after we've gotten what we wanted--keep him for you to practice on."

"I don't know anything," Alexander rasped out. He blinked and looked at Sheppard with big eyes.

"Oh, stop it," Sheppard snapped. "The innocence thing didn't work on Rodney and it sure as hell won't work on me. And stop looking at me that way. I'm not _that_ easily distracted.

"Do his other foot," he said to Rodney.

Sheppard had Rodney use the taser on Alexander's feet a few more times and then he paused and looked down at Alexander, who was crying for real now and panting hard.

"You're what? Twenty-four?"

When Alexander remained quiet, Sheppard reached down to the pack he'd brought with him. Pulling out a flat box, he set it on the nearby cart. "When I went through Special Ops training, they taught me how to deal with penny ante torture like this. I'm pretty sure State Sec or Euro Sec taught you some of the same things.

"On the other hand...." He opened the box and tilted it up; Rodney saw a set of syringes.

"LSD-V. They also gave me some of it and I'm pretty sure you got some too. Do you remember what it felt like? At one point my trainer had me convinced cockroaches were crawling around in my brain."

"Ew," Rodney blurted out and then blushed beet red. Some interrogator he was. But still...

Sheppard kept talking. "I was given a code word and told I'd get the flogging of a lifetime if I gave it up. I did, of course. Just like you'll tell me everything you know."

"Why not just use regular truth drugs?" Alexander asked and now he sounded afraid.

"That's no fun," Sheppard said. He glanced at Rodney. "Hit him with the taser again. On his balls this time."

"No!" Alexander said. "No...I'll...."

Rodney glanced at Sheppard, who nodded. Taking a deep breath, Rodney pressed the taser against Alexander's balls.

"You know," Rodney said, once the shrieking had died down. "I'm going to suggest carving up your face once he's given you the drug. Maybe we can convince you that your skin is on fire. And you know, we could actually set your skin on fire, with or without the drug."

"Twenty-six," Alexander ground out. "I'm twenty-six."

Rodney glanced at Sheppard, who gestured at his pack. "There's a scanner in there. Get it out and keep an eye on it. It's set up as a polygraph."

The scanner was pretty easy to read; Rodney had it figured out in seconds.

"What's your real name?" Sheppard asked.

"Alexander," he said. "Really, that's my real name. Alexander Tavish."

"Euro Sec?"

"Yes." He closed his eyes. "Please...don't use the LSD-V on me. Please."

"We'll see." Sheppard didn't put the case down. "They told you I liked pretty boys, right? What else?"

"That you'd hurt me. That all I had to do was take it and look pathetic and fragile."

Sheppard snorted. "They sure got that wrong."

Rodney opened his mouth and then thought about it; he hardly qualified as fragile any more and he damn well didn't look pathetic. He probably had at the beginning, though, and maybe that's what Lorne's reports back to Earth had said.

That he'd changed and Sheppard still wanted him was something he'd think about later.

"What were you supposed to do besides wind up over my lap?"

"Just...watch you. See if you're loyal."

"And if I'm not?" Sheppard leaned forward. "Were you supposed to kill me?"

"No," Alexander shook his head, staring up at Sheppard earnestly. "I don't do wet work, I swear."

"Rodney?"

"It's steady; he's not lying."

"So, if I'm not loyal? What then?"

"I put it in my report." Alexander sighed and let out a long breath. "My contact...please, Colonel, I...."

"Tell me." Sheppard's voice was hard.

"Sergeant Linder."

Before Sheppard, who looked shocked, could ask, Rodney nodded. "He's telling the truth, Sir." He held up the scanner.

"Linder," Sheppard said, his face blank now. "The Quartermaster?"

"Yes."

"Who else?"

"There were a couple of other State Sec agents among the prisoners and two in the new platoon. The prisoners are both on Bespin...the mining colony. They were supposed to talk to Dr. Zelenka and anyone else who might have supported Major Lorne."

"Shit," Rodney muttered. "Did they? How did it go?"

To his surprise, Alexander shook his head. "Zelenka wouldn't deal."

"Why not?" Sheppard asked.

"He said he'd made a mistake and he wasn't going to make another one."

"Really?"

"That's what they told me, Sir. I'm telling the truth, I promise."

He was, too; Rodney nodded at Sheppard again.

"Is Linder State Sec? Or Military Intelligence?"

"I don't know. He's just my contact."

"What else do you know?" Sheppard paused and then closed the case and set it aside.

"Not much." Alexander sighed and slumped in his bonds. "I'm just here to look pretty and get your attention."

Rodney couldn't help laughing. "Yeah, that worked out well."

"Tell me about it," Alexander sighed.

"Wait, what about Teldy?" Sheppard said. "Or Jordan?"

"I was told not to talk to them, Sir."

"Okay," Sheppard paused and looked around the lab. "Why don't we keep him here for now. I'll put a couple of the Athosians on the door and we'll decide what to do with him this afternoon."

"Please, Sir," Alexander said. "I...please, if you kill me, make it quick."

"I'll consider it," Sheppard said, reaching for his pack. "C'mon, Rodney."

* * *

That same afternoon John sat down in his quarters with his team and Rodney. "So, Linder. I had no fucking idea," he said, picking at a sandwich. He finally shoved his plate aside, unable to even think about food.

He'd never even thought that the support staff could be spies. What about Ruiz? What about his pilots? Goddamnit, who could he trust? He glared around the table, wondering if he could even trust his team. And what about Rodney? He took a long breath.

He really needed to get a grip. As hard as it was to believe it right now, he could trust his team. And he had to trust Rodney; how could he not when Rodney had saved his ass? Still, it was hard to just sit here when all his instincts were telling him to move, to do something, to fight back. He breathed in deep again and tried to pay attention to the conversation.

His other distraction--the lingering arousal from watching Rodney with Alexander--was a minor issue, although he was already thinking about how to reward Rodney.

"Makes sense, though," Ronon was saying. "He's in a position to communicate with Earth. After all, who's gonna check all the requisitions?"

"Yeah," John said. "All this time I was worried about Jordan and Teldy and Elizabeth...."

"Did you ask him about Elizabeth?" Jeannie asked.

"No," John said. "I'll ask Linder about her. Speaking of which, since I don't know who else is working with him, I'll want to question him in his quarters, out of sight. So Rodney, we'll need to gas him."

"Okay," Rodney said, reaching for his tablet. "I can do that." He paused and then tapped a few keys. "Hang on. He's in his quarters right now, or someone is. I'll need to use my other lap top to see if it's him." He left the table and headed toward his desk.

"You want me to question him?" Ronon asked.

John shook his head. "No, I've had enough entertainment today." He sighed. "I just want to shoot him up with some truth serum, but can we trust Keller to monitor him?"

"She owes you a great deal," Teyla said. "And she is seeing one of the midwives on the mainland."

"Oh, thank God," John said. "We can always threaten her girlfriend if we need to."

Teyla nodded just as Rodney said, "Colonel? That's Linder in his quarters and he's alone."

"Can you drop some gas in on him without anyone knowing?"

"Yeah," Rodney said, making it sound a lot like "duh." John rolled his eyes, but didn't call him on it. He'd learned that when Rodney was in the middle of something, he was less than respectful. John usually let it go; he'd rather have Rodney concentrating on his work and he could always have fun correcting him later.

"Do it," he said. "Teyla, you and I need to go pick up Keller. Ronon, why don't you come with us. Jeannie," he paused and thought for a moment. "Can you come up with some reason to keep people out of the hall near Linder's quarters? If he has any allies, I don't want them to know what's going on."

"I can break something and then go in and repair it." She shrugged. "No one bugs me when I'm fixing things."

"No one bugs you when you do anything," Rodney said before turning to John. "I think I'll just stay here, if that's okay with you, Sir?"

He looked a little lost and John suddenly remembered that for all his intelligence and seeming maturity, Rodney was just a kid. A kid who'd just conducted his first interrogation.

"Okay," John said. "Jeannie, go break something. Radio us when you've got the corridor cleared. "Teyla, Ronon...can you give me a moment?"

"We will meet you in the infirmary," Teyla said. "I am sure we can come up with a reason to talk to Jennifer."

"How long do you want me to keep him gassed?" Rodney asked as everyone else left.

"Once we hear from Jeannie, I'll know better." John paused. "You did good back there."

"Right," Rodney said with a snort. "I was totally flailing."

"Oh, sure you were," John agreed, amused when Rodney's eyes narrowed a little. "But that bit about burning his face was inspired."

"He's pretty," Rodney said. "I think it's all he has."

"Don't tell me you feel sorry for him."

"I don't, really. Not for him. Just...." Rodney fidgeted with his tablet.

"You can't help think of yourself in that situation?"

"It's more that I can't help wondering if I was in that situation. Remember when you asked me if anyone had talked to me about you? They didn't, but I wonder if they felt that they didn't need to."

It was hardly a new thought for John, and now he shrugged. "It doesn't really matter, given everything that's happened. Hell, even Jeannie had no idea that...." He trailed off, trying to find the right words. "That you'd suit me as well as you do."

Rodney ducked his head. "If she'd known," he finally said, "she'd have left me on Earth."

"Probably." John reached out and ran a hand over the back of Rodney's neck, pressing the collar into his skin. "Think about what you want as a reward."

"What?" Rodney blinked and John chuckled.

"Like I said, you were good in there. You get to decide what we do tonight."

"Oh," Rodney said. "Um...I'll have to think about it."

"You'll have plenty of time. I want you to stay in here while we're dealing with Linder."

"Okay."

"Colonel?" John reached up and tapped his earpiece.

"Yeah, McKay?"

"The lights have gone screwy in corridor N-15. I'm going to be working on them in about five minutes."

"Okay," John said. "Did you tell Campbell to keep people out of your way?"

"Yes," she said. "And they damn well better listen this time or there'll be hell to pay."

The conversation over, John looked at Rodney. "Gotta go. Places to be, people to interrogate."

"Good luck with it," Rodney said.

After all the careful set up, interrogating Linder was almost too easy. Thanks to his Special Ops training, John was a drug-certified interrogator, but still, he preferred to have medical backup during important questioning. While he knew Linder didn't have any obvious suicide devices, there were drugs that could interfere with interrogation medication, and so he had Keller with him when they unlocked Linder's door.

Luckily, the anti-truth drug regimes had to be maintained fairly often and Linder had obviously gotten complacent on Atlantis. In fact, he looked almost comically surprised when the gas wore off and he woke up strapped to a chair facing John, who had a syringe in one hand.

"It was the kid," he said, and John nodded. "Yeah," Linder went on, "I thought he was a weak link. Stupid fucks at State Sec."

"You're Mil Intel?" John asked.

"Yeah. Just do it, okay?"

 _There are,_ John thought as he injected Linder, _advantages to dealing with a professional._

* * *

"So," John said, once more picking at his food. The team had assembled again in his quarters, this time for dinner. "Fuck."

"That's putting it mildly," Ronon said.

"Feel like sharing?" Jeannie asked. Before John could say anything, she turned and glared at Rodney. "Don't inhale your food."

"Thanks, _Mom,_ " Rodney said with a scowl. "Can we please stay focused?"

"Shut up, both of you," John snapped. He still wasn't sure what was better--Jeannie and Rodney not speaking to one another or putting up with their fucked up family dynamic. "Rodney, get me some bourbon--the good stuff. Anyone else want anything?"

"I would like some bourbon as well," Teyla murmured.

"Beer," Ronon said.

"You have any rum?" Jeannie asked. "And a coke, too."

John waited until everyone had their drinks and then, after a smooth sip of bourbon, he took a deep breath.

"It could be a lot worse," he said. "State Sec and Mil Sec are still in the planning stages and, of course, there's the usual territory wrangling between the services. But....

"They want to get rid of all of us," he said. "Me, Elizabeth, Jeannie, Keller, most of the science division.... They think we've all gone native. And, of course, speaking of natives, they don't want any Pegasus natives on Atlantis, and they don't want any natives who know _where_ Atlantis is, so it's pretty obvious what they have planned for you and your people, Teyla."

That it also meant that people on Earth weren't thinking about how the city could be moved to a different location he kept to himself.

"Jesus," Jeannie said. "How the hell do they think they'll be able to maintain the city without native allies?"

"They don't intend to maintain it the way we have been. It seems they like the idea of this being a nice little prison set up, so the plan is to have a mostly military garrison with frequently rotating personnel. The prisoners will be set to mining or farming to keep the garrison going."

"No science at all?" Rodney asked.

"Very little. Linder wasn't certain, but from what he said, it sounds like they plan on bringing military scientists in, and they'll be rotated in and out the way the rest of the personnel is."

"That's insane!" Jennie said. "Is something happening back home?"

"Linder didn't know a lot, but it seems like the various nationalist resistance movements are actually starting to do some real damage. I'm not as up on high-level politics are Elizabeth is; now that we know she's a target as well, we should probably bring her further in and let her see what we got from Linder and whatever we get from the spies among the prisoners and the new platoon. She'll be better able to understand the political situation back on Earth."

"Yeah," Jeannie said. "How many spies did they send us?"

"Not too many, actually. The next shipment of prisoners and accompanying troops is supposed to be the real push." He sighed, trying not to think of how lucky they'd been. "The new platoon's medic and its signal officer are spies. I already told you about the prisoners, right?"

"Yes." She scowled. "I'm still not sure I trust Zelenka."

"Yeah, well, we can worry about him later." John leaned back, finished his drink and closed his eyes.

In the silence that fell over the room, John could hear the sound of Rodney working though his dinner.

"Sorry," Rodney mumbled and John couldn't help a little snort of laughter.

"Okay," he said. "Here's the kicker: we've got two days before Linder has to make a report, and I'd rather not have to fake one if we don't have to. It'd be too easy to screw it up."

"Two days?" Ronon stared at him.

"Yeah," John said. "As soon as we do our usual data exchange and they see that Linder hasn't reported in, the clock starts ticking. If they weren't already suspicious of us, they might wait until the next week's data dump, but I personally think they'll send out a ship before waiting to confirm that we're on to him."

He sighed. "So it will take maybe a day or two for them to make their plans and then what, eighteen to twenty days for a _Prometheus_ class ship to get here at top speed?"

"Yeah," Jeannie said with a frown. "What if we can't find a ZPM in that time?"

"Do we have enough power to move the city?"

"You mean relocate?" Jeannie frowned. "We could do it, but not very far, which means they'd have some good guesses as to where we've gone. And we'd be pretty desperate for power once we got there."

"That can't be helped." John pinched the bridge of his nose. "Okay, here's what we're going to do. First, we're going to weed out the spies and the State loyalists. We'll interrogate the known spies and get all the names we can, and then we'll need to go through everyone else and see who's with us. Ronon, I want you on that, although we're going to have to delegate some of it. After I talk to Jordan and Teldy, the three of you can coordinate it with Elizabeth. Oh, and Keller, of course."

"I'll have a talk with Simpson as well," Jeannie said. "If I get the right answers from her, I'll send her to you, Ronon."

"And I will talk to Jennifer," Teyla said. "Should I have her meet with Ronon as well?"

"Yeah," John said.

"So, what," Ronon asked with a grin. "I'm now Head of Security?"

"Yeah," John said. "We need one, and I can't think of anyone I'd rather have in the position."

"Thanks."

"Just don't fuck it up." John turned to Jeannie. "I want you to find us two locations--one we can reach without extra ZPMs and one we can reach with more power. I'll put a couple of pilots at your disposal to check potential sites out."

He turned to Teyla. "Can your people be ready to move from the mainland that fast? I was thinking that we'd send most of them to the mining site, unless you have another address you think would work better."

"It will just be short term?"

"Yes," John said. "I promise you that. As soon as we've chased off whoever they send after us, your people will be welcome in the city and on whatever planet we end up on."

"Very well. I will talk to my council and we will begin the move as soon as possible."

"Good."

"So we're going to go after whoever they send?" Ronon asked.

"If we have the power to do it, yes. If not, we'll have to hide and do the best we can." John brushed the thought aside. "I'll need time to work out a plan of attack, so let's not worry about that now. When you start questioning people, I want you to clear a couple of recon teams as quickly as you can; we'll need to have them check out some of our ZPM addresses."

"Okay."

"I'm going to meet with Elizabeth as soon as we're done here." John said. "As for you guys, you know what the plan is--loyalty checks, moving the Athosians to Bespin, and locating a new site for the city." Everyone nodded. "Okay, that's it for now, but I want you to keep the day after tomorrow free for a mission."

"A mission?" Jeannie frowned. "Is this really the time for us to be going on missions?"

"Yeah, we're going after that lab on Larish."

* * *

Three hours later, John finally returned to his quarters. He was exhausted but wound up; the meeting with Elizabeth had gone well and he found himself ready to move forward. But it was late and Jordan was on duty and Teldy was probably asleep, and anyway, he was too tired to have the discussion one more time.

Rodney was still up. He was seated at his desk working on his lap top, but when John got closer, he discovered that Rodney was only wearing boxers.

"Jesus fucking Christ, what a day," he said, and Rodney snorted.

"Yeah, no kidding. It's like...the whole thing with Alexander happened years ago." He got up and poured John a drink. "What did you do with him?"

"He's locked up in a cell next to Linder; they're under Athosian guard." John settled on the bed, sipping his bourbon while Rodney returned to his desk.

"How'd the meeting with Dr. Weir go?"

"Not bad. She's pretty sure Hayes is facing some pretty stiff opposition from inside his party as well as from the various resistance groups. Apparently he tends toward a bunker mentality when he's threatened. We're a loose end with too much power, so we need to be snipped."

"Kinda short sighted, isn't it?"

"Not really. He's still got sources of alien tech there in the Milky Way galaxy, and if we're out of the picture, he can keep all of the space fleet, such as it is, in orbit above Earth. All the better to call in air strikes against his enemies."

Rodney was quiet for a long moment, tapping at his keyboard, and John got the feeling he was working up to saying or asking for something difficult. When the question came, however, it was the last thing John expected.

"Sir?"

"Yeah?"

"What about your brother? And the rest of your family?"

"What?"

"Sorry," Rodney said, ducking his head. "I just...I'm so sorry, sir."

John looked at his drink, thinking about Dave and Dave's elegant wife, Margaret, and their picture perfect kids. He thought about Nancy and her meek, biddable second husband, and his Dad's second wife and his fourth one, and all the lesser Sheppards--the aunts, uncles and cousins who had revolved around his father like so many satellites.

 _Thank God all of them are Dave's problem now. Although...._

"I hope," he said after a very long moment, "that if it comes to bombs being tossed around or strikes from space being called in, no one hurts the horses." Before Rodney could apologize again, John continued.

"What about you?"

"I'll miss chocolate and coffee," Rodney said. "And the journals."

"Yeah, I wish I'd had a chance to get another case or two of this bourbon." John chuckled. "What's Jeannie going to do without her Diet Coke?"

"Be even more of a bitch than before."

"Poor Ronon."

"Yeah." Rodney stared at his lap top for a long moment. "Do you feel like it should be more...I don't know... momentous? I mean, there you were, four of you, planning out the secession of Earth's first intergalactic colony. Five people in a room."

John hadn't really thought about it that way, but now he laughed a little. "We should have had a soundtrack of ultimate destiny, at least."

"Totally," Rodney said. He keyed in something and then got up from his chair. "Can I get a rain check?"

"Huh?"

"You promised me a reward, but really, you've had a much harder day than I did...."

"C'mere," John said. He was starting to come down and he had a hell of a lot to do tomorrow, and, as much as he hated to admit it, even to himself, he really didn't feel like doing anything strenuous tonight. On the other hand, sex would probably help him sleep.

He grabbed the lube and handed it to Rodney. "Slick yourself up and ride me."

John couldn't help smiling when Rodney rushed it, but then he was gasping and pushing up with his hips while Rodney moved down on him fast and hard. "Greedy," he said and Rodney paused.

"Well, yeah," Rodney said. "But if you want slow...."

"Yeah, slow," John said. As Rodney started moving, John ran his finger down Rodney's chest. "You didn't like it, did you?"

"Not like that," Rodney said, already a little breathless. "Not like you do."

"You didn't want him?"

Rodney shook his head and bent down to put a hand on the bed next to John's chest. "Did you like it? Seeing me...?"

"Yeah," John said without thinking. "The knife," he added, dragging his finger back up Rodney's chest. "I want to do that to you."

"Fuck," Rodney moaned and closed his eyes. "I...yeah, that." He was silent for a moment, moving steadily over John. "You'd like that," he finally said, opening his eyes. "Like to see me bleed."

"Hell, yeah." John reached up and grabbed Rodney's hips, holding him still as John fucked up into him hard. "You want it, too, don't you?"

"Yeah," Rodney said, his voice almost dreamy. He moaned as John kept fucking him and then he reached up ran his finger...no, his fingernail, down his own chest, leaving a white line behind.

"Jesus," John muttered. "It'd hurt more than that."

"I know...God, you're so good at hurting me."

"And you fucking love it." John dug his fingers into Rodney's hips and watched as the pain made Rodney bite his lower lip. "Don't you, boy?"

"Yes, Sir," Rodney said.

"My little pain slut," John said. Before Rodney could answer, John added, "hang on."

It wasn't easy to stay inside Rodney while rolling them both over, but John managed, and as soon as they were in position, Rodney wrapped his legs around John's waist. John grabbed Rodney's wrists and shoved them over his head, holding them tightly while he started fucking Rodney as hard as he could.

"Gonna use my knife on you," he said, bending down so his mouth was right near Rodney's ear. "Gonna make you bleed...fuck you like that...make you know you're mine."

"Oh, God," Rodney said. "Want it...but I know...oh fuck...please...."

"Know what?" John stopped and used his weight to keep Rodney still when he tried to buck up under John. "What do you know?"

"Already know I'm yours," Rodney said roughly. "That you can do whatever...oh God...you want to me and make me...fuck...like it."

"Fuck...." John groaned. "If you're gonna come...do it now!"

Rodney closed his eyes, tilted his head back and came.

"Mine," John gasped as Rodney went tight around his dick. He managed to say "mine" once and then again before he shoved into Rodney _hard_ and came.

He stayed where he was, hands on Rodney's wrists, for a long moment before the closeness got to be too much. Rolling over, he waited while Rodney got a towel and cleaned them both up.

"I want to mark you," John said, before he could stop himself.

"I think you did," Rodney said, tossing the towel aside. He held out his wrist and John could see the faint red marks that would turn into bruises soon enough.

"No," he said, even as he reached out to hold Rodney's wrist. He rubbed a thumb over the marks, watching as Rodney closed his eyes and shivered. "A permanent mark. Something that makes it clear you're mine."

Rodney's eyes flew open. "I thought that was the point of the collar." He glanced down at his chest. "And the rings."

"Those can be removed." John tightened his grip, expecting Rodney to argue, but Rodney just nodded.

"What did you have in mind, Sir?"

"I'm not sure. A tattoo, I think." It had been an almost idle thought, but the more John considered it, the more he liked the idea. "Ronon knows how to do it," he said. "Part of his training as an officer."

"How about something in Ancient?" Rodney asked. "It's really close to Latin...." He broke off and laughed.

"Feel like sharing?"

"Ioannes Atlanticus, Imperator," Rodney said.

"No thank you," John said, but he couldn't help smiling a little. "Too much work."

"Dux Bellorum?"

Reaching out, John turned off his light. "Bed time, little catamite."

"Okay, I deserved that," Rodney said. He turned off his own light and then settled down next to John.

"How'd you learn Roman titles, anyway?"

"Same way I learned most things: got interested, read a book." Rodney sighed. "I joke about the chocolate, but books are what I'm really going to miss."

John thought about his father's library and nodded. "Yeah," he said. "We should collect books here in Pegasus," he said. "The Larish do it; why shouldn't we have a library?"

"We should," Rodney said and the bed moved, as if he'd bounced just a little. John heard him take a deep breath. "About the mark...I want it."

"I'll think of something," John said. "It'll have to wait until all this is over."

"Yeah."

Later, after Rodney's breathing evened out, John turned the day's events over in his head. Five people in a room...but no, for him, it had started before that, even before he'd first talked to Rodney.

 _Dux Bellorum,_ he thought, rolling it over in his head. _War Duke of Atlantis._

It had, he had to admit, quite a ring to it.

* * *

Four days later, flying the jumper through to Larish felt almost like the beginning of a vacation. John had had to put the mission off for a couple of days while he and the rest of his team worked frantically to winnow out the spies and State loyalists among the inhabitants of Atlantis. They hadn't gotten everyone, but John was pretty sure they'd weeded out all the truly bad apples.

They'd restricted gate travel even more than usual--the DHD was locked down and all gate traffic now had to be cleared with John, Ronon, Jordan or Teldy. John himself had questioned Jordan and Teldy and then he'd moved on to Chuck Campbell and discovered that he had what turned out to be a very common attitude.

"We're breaking ties with Earth?" Campbell had said. When John had nodded, a little surprised by his eagerness, Campbell had grinned at him and rolled up his sleeve. "I'm on your side, but hit me with the truth drugs if you need to, Colonel." John had, because Campbell could case a lot of trouble if he turned out to be a spy or a loyalist, but it turned out that Campbell was just as eager under medication as he was without it.

The more people they talked to, the more it seemed that no one on Atlantis wanted to have anything to do with Earth. John wasn't surprised to find that some of the civilians, both scientists and support staff, had connections to various resistance movements, but he'd been a little taken aback when it turned out Lt. Freemantle, one of John's better pilots, had been given a choice of Atlantis or Leavenworth because his sister had been involved in a mid-level resistance cell.

They already knew who most of the spies were, but John wasn't surprised at all when he sat down with Lt. Morgenstern and the nervous young man told him that he didn't think he could support John's "rebellion."

"But I won't stand against you, sir," Morgenstern said. "And I won't try to turn the men in my original platoon against you, either."

"No, you won't," John said. He thought about killing Morgenstern, but in the end, he locked him up instead. He planned on contacting Earth one more time, and he might as well send the loyalists back. And anyway, Morgenstern had had the balls to stand up to John, which had to count for something.

Now, as John piloted through the Larish night, he felt a weight lifting off his shoulders. He'd spent too much time in small rooms asking people the same questions over and over and he really wasn't cut out for it. Thank God for Ronon and also Teldy--who'd proven quite good at working her way through the personnel questioning. He made a mental note to talk to Ronon about setting her up as Deputy Head of Security; it would make the rest of the Expedition happy to have someone from Earth involved in Security.

It was dawn on the island John had mapped out during their library mission, and once they landed, he took a moment to check the place out. It was a fairly typical tropical island with broad sandy beaches and a volcanic mountain in the middle of it.

"Nice waves, and no one living here. We should keep this place for ourselves."

"It is very lovely," Teyla agreed.

"Yeah, whatever," Jeannie muttered. "Okay, it looks like the energy readings are this way, near the peak."

They had to do a little blasting through the jungle with their energy pistols, but even that was kind of fun, and it only took an hour or so before Jeannie was pointing to a metal panel set into a ropey mass of old lava.

"You think there's an underground villain's lair down here?" Jeannie asked as they carefully walked down a metal-lined corridor.

"I dunno," John replied, "but if I see a guy with a white cat, I'm gonna shoot first and ask questions later."

"Because you wouldn't do that anyway?"

"Fuck you, McKay."

For once, she didn't say anything about Rodney.

There weren't any booby traps, but the closer they got to the actual lab the quieter Jeannie got.

"Hey," Ronon said, resting a hand on the small of her back. "You okay?"

"Yeah," she said, her eyes glued to her scanner. "I'm...yeah, I'm okay."

Ronon clearly didn't think so, and neither did John, but Jeannie just walked up to the door of the lab and pulled her tablet and cables out of her tac vest. When the door slid open she paused for a long moment.

"McKay?"

"I...." Taking a deep breath she stepped forward and walked over to a familiar looking console. "It's...basically, it's a ZPM power station," she said, pushing a button. "And...oh yeah, baby, come to momma."

Under other circumstances, John would have found that "come to momma" a little freaky, but he found he really didn't care as what looked like a full ZPM rose up out of the console. "Is it...?" His voice trailed off as she shoved it at him and then pushed another button.

"Jesus," he said, his voice hushed. "Two of them?"

"Two," Jeannie said, handing it over to Teyla. "And a quarter...maybe a fifth." The last ZPM she pulled out of the console was darker and obviously mostly depleted, but John didn't exactly feel robbed or anything.

"We can do this," he said quietly, a little surprised at the relief that washed over him. He hadn't exactly doubted himself, only...well, maybe he had. "We can really fucking do this."

And then, because he really couldn't resist the opportunity to yank Jeannie's chain, he turned to her. "Good thing Rodney found this site, seeing as it's been under our noses for a couple years now."

"You," Jeannie said, still looking happier than he'd ever seen her, "cannot ruin this moment for me, so stop trying."

Ronon took the last ZPM from Jeannie and looked at it. "Wonder what a bomb armed with this would do to a hive ship."

"Are you kidding?" Jeannie said. "A bomb armed with even a depleted ZPM would take out a whole fucking solar system."

"I believe we have other matters to deal with before we can start bombing things," Teyla said, and John nodded, although he tucked the idea of a ZPM armed bomb away for future contemplation.

"Yeah, let's get these back to Atlantis."

* * *

Rodney had spent the last four days holed up in his lab. Ronon had come in with him on the first day and talked to both Mullins and Phillips, but he hadn't even bothered to use drugs on either of them. Since then, they'd all kept their heads down in Rodney's lab. They hadn't even had to go to the mess hall, because the crackdown had begun, Phillips had showed up for work bright and early with a case of MREs and one of Coke.

"Oh hey," Rodney said. "Good idea. We'll eat the MREs instead of going to the mess, but let's save the Coke for barter later." He frowned. "Where'd you get this stuff?"

"One of the platoon--Russell; I gave her name to Ronon yesterday because she always has a lot of extras from the Quartermaster and so she might be involved, you know? Anyway, she runs the black market and I know where she keeps some of her stuff."

"Really? Does anyone else know?"

"Don't think so...she found a deserted suite in an unused area of the city. I was the only other one with her when we did that security sweep." Phillips brought up a map on one of the Ancient consoles. "Here. She brought me in on the action to keep me quiet about it."

"Sweet," Rodney said. He reached down and touched a few keys. "I've locked it up to a code. Don't worry, you'll get a cut, but, depending on what's in there...." He paused and sat down as it hit him yet again--once they finished the last of their supplies from Earth, that was it He hadn't lied to Sheppard, there was no one he'd miss, but there were plenty of things he'd miss. Not just the chocolate and coffee he'd joked about, but the books he already missed, the ones he'd been meaning to order box by box until he had a decent library of textbooks and reference material.

"It'll be incredibly valuable," he finally said. After taking a deep breath, he leaned back in his chair.

"Here's the thing," he said and Mullins and Namin both looked up from their work. "We're going to be the equivalent of military scientists. We might not have rank, well, aside from Phillips here, but more and more, we're going to be the scientists Sheppard comes to when he wants things researched.

"Of course, right now, there are only four of us, so we need every advantage we can, including things like cases of Coke."

"It's more than soda," Phillips said. "Russell's got booze, weed, other drugs."

"Jesus," Rodney said. "I might just have to get you a promotion."

"Are you going to try to recruit more people?" Mullins asked.

"Once everything shakes down, maybe. It depends on who's left and who's useful." Rodney shrugged. "At the very least I want to get a couple more Athosian clerks so Namin doesn't have to do all the boring translating jobs, but other than that? We'll see."

He did want more help, but it wasn't going to be easy. And right then, he'd needed to knuckle down and find the damn drone manufacturing site he'd been looking for on and off since he first started to work in this lab.

* * *

Two days later, right after Sheppard's team returned quietly to the city from their mission to Larish, Sheppard showed up in the doorway to the lab.

"Come with me and bring your stuff," Sheppard said. He was silent as he led Rodney down the hall to the transporter, and then into a section of the city Rodney had never been in. He recognized it however from the maps and he shot a little glance at Sheppard.

"Really?"

"Yeah," Sheppard said, a tiny smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

The rest of Sheppard's team was in the power room and Jeannie scowled a little as the door closed behind John and Rodney, but she said nothing as she opened a silver case and took a ZPM out of it.

Rodney had never actually seen a ZPM--photos, drawings, yes, but never an actual ZPM in the flesh, so to speak. He stared at it as Jeannie carefully lowered it into the receptacle. Lights flashed across the board and she nodded, breathing out what looked like a sigh of relief.

"Okay, I've restricted the power flow, so the additional power won't show up on the routine power consumption reports."

"Good," Sheppard began, but Rodney leaned forward.

"Jeannie, I think the internal mapping system is one of the secondary or maybe even tertiary systems that are inactive because of power conservation protocols. Is there any chance I can access the power?"

"Yeah," she said, "but you'll need to work from here. Here, I'll show you how to bypass the system so that your usage doesn't show up in the reports."

She walked him through the necessary steps and authorized him to access the system from any secure terminal.

"Good," Sheppard said again. "Rodney, I want you to drop everything else and give me as much information as you can about the external defense system. With everything going on, I've already put the power room off limits to prevent sabotage, so you can work from here. Make sure you have Namin or Rath with you at all times. And do not let _anyone_ other than Namin know that we have the ZPMs, you understand?" When Rodney nodded, Sheppard frowned.

"Yes, Sir," Rodney said. Then, as Sheppard relaxed, he asked. "ZPMs, plural?"

"Two and a fifth," Jeannie said.

"We should put a guard on this room," Teyla said. "Is there anyone trustworthy we can spare?"

"Yeah," Ronon said. "I'll pull a couple guys off my list."

"Keep 'em down the corridor," John said. "Right now, my guy and Namin on the door should be enough."

"You're going to stay down here?" Jeannie said.

"Unless anyone needs me somewhere else," Sheppard replied. "I need to rethink my tactics now that we have more power."

"Well, unless anyone needs me and Ronon, we're going to go celebrate," Jeannie said, grabbing Ronon's hand.

"Because I wanted to hear that," Sheppard muttered as they took off.

"I should go, too," Teyla began.

"Um, Ms. Emmagan?" Rodney said. "Can I speak to you for a moment?"

"Of course," she said, settling down on one of the benches that ringed the room.

"Phillips, my engineer? He is...was active in the black market. Sergeant Russell really ran it, but...."

"Yes," she said. "I am aware of this. Sergeant Russell is currently imprisoned."

"Did Phillips turn Russell in to get her out of the way?" Sheppard asked.

Rodney blinked; that hadn't occurred to him. "All he told me was that he gave Ronon Russell's name because she always got extra stuff from the Quartermaster, so he thought they were close.

"Anyway, when you questioned Russell, did she tell you where her stash is?"

"I dunno," Sheppard said as Teyla shook her head.

"No, he did not."

"I know where it is, and I've locked it up under a code only I know."

"Rodney," Teyla said with a slight smile. "Are you planning on taking over the black market?"

"Phillips is my guy," Rodney said. "He didn't have to tell me, and I didn't have to tell you. I did because I know I'd be in deep shit if I didn't, but I want to reserve some of that stuff for trading both here on Atlantis and with our allies."

"Teyla?" Sheppard said, looking at her.

"While I think we need to wait and see how things settle down here," she said, "having control over the last Earth luxury items would give Rodney a useful advantage."

Rodney opened his mouth and then closed it again, looking at Sheppard. He felt a little like he had the one and only time he'd asked his dad for a raise in his allowance, about three weeks before he'd learned how to hack into the banks.

"Yeah, all right," Sheppard said.

"I was thinking of leaving Phillips in charge of it," Rodney said. "He knows all of Russell's contacts."

"Very well," Teyla said. "We can discuss this further after we have gained a measure of security."

"Thank you," Rodney said. "Both of you."

"You are welcome. And now, I should meet with Elizabeth. John, may I tell her about the ZPM?"

"Tell her we have one."

"Very well."

"So, you're now the black market king of Atlantis?" Sheppard asked. He'd been leaning against a wall, but now he picked up his laptop, which had been sitting on a console and settled down in a chair, propping his feet up on the power console.

"Gotta start somewhere," Rodney said, opening up his computer bag. He pulled out his primary laptop and plugged it into one of the Ancient consoles. "Is that a problem?"

"No, I actually think it's a good idea. As long as I get the good stuff."

"I'll find out what kind of alcohol's in the stash."

"Okay." Sheppard went silent and Rodney looked up to find him engrossed in his work.

Smiling, Rodney turned back to his own laptop as the portal to the Ancient database portal opened up. He accessed the city's external weapons systems and blinked. "Wow...."

"Anything interesting?" Sheppard asked.

Rodney didn't even look up. "Too early to tell," he said. "But there are a lot more subdirectories visible than there were this morning." He pulled out his tablet and accessed his translation program.

"Um, Sir?"

"Yeah?"

"What do you need the most?"

"More drones," Sheppard said. "Although...the SGC has had drones to study since they found the Antarctica base. When they come after us, they'll have an anti-drone doctrine in place."

"Oh, I hadn't thought of that. Can I bring Namin in here and set him to looking for drones while I dig through the new stuff?"

"Sure." Sheppard went back to his work.

As usual, Namin was almost invisibly quiet in Sheppard's presence. Rodney had set him up at a terminal and then settled down himself with his lap top and for a long while, the only sound in the room was the soft rattle and click of computer keys.

"Namin?" Rodney said about an hour later. "What's _athmerak_ mean?"

"Superior," Namin said. "Or maybe...improved?"

"Huh...." Rodney followed the link to "superior/improved drone weapons" and then frowned and backtracked to see if he was looking at manufacturing or supplies, but no, the phrase appeared in both and it didn't have the prefix character that meant "experimental"....

It took him almost an hour to wade through the information, but when he did, he went very still as he took in the text spilling across the screen in Ancient.

"Holy fuck," he murmured.

He was only dimly aware of the thunk as the two front feet of Sheppard's chair hit the floor. "Rodney?"

"Gimme a minute...."

It was actually five minutes before he was sure, and that was only after he'd plugged several terms into his tablet to check the translation.

"Rodney!"

"Okay...." Rodney took a deep breath. "The drones were never meant to be anything but basic weapons. Kind of like simple anti-aircraft missiles, right?"

"They pack a bigger punch, but yeah, I know what you mean."

"But say you're a big ship and you're shooting at another big ship...."

"Like the _Daedalus_ going against a hive ship? They used nuclear missiles and Asgard plasma beam weapons."

"Right, and two and a half weeks doesn't give us much of a chance to build any of those."

"We have a few nukes socked away," Sheppard said. "Built with supplies we took from the Genii. But they know about those back on Earth, too."

"But," Rodney said, pulling up a schematic, "do they know about these?" He turned the lap top toward Sheppard.

"What am I looking...a bigger drone?"

"A...well, call it a super drone, for want of a better term."

"Is that...fuck, does it really have...what is that? Thirteen times the yield of a regular drone?"

"Thirteen, yeah."

"There has to be a catch," Sheppard said. "Too much has been going our way."

"The catch is that there are only five of them in storage. Near as I can tell, they use the same manufacturing site as the regular drones, so if...when we find that we'll be able to make more, but until then this is it."

"Two of these could take out the _Daedalus_." Sheppard frowned. "Thing is, I'm not sure I want to do that."

"What?" Rodney said with a scowl of his own. Here he'd found ship-killers for Sheppard and it wasn't what Sheppard wanted?

"I want to be able to damage the ship as lightly as possible. If we have a chance, I'd like to capture it."

"Okay, fine," Rodney said. "But I don't know that the Ancients were big on capturing hive ships."

Muttering "you're welcome," he went back to the list of external defense sub-directories. The hard smack to the back of his head brought him up short.

"Sorry, Sir."

"You need to learn to focus. If you do something good, you'll get thanked for it when I have time." Sheppard took a deep breath. "Look, when we're in the field and the clock is running, I can't be bothered with manners."

 _You can't be bothered with them most of the time, clock running or not._ Since Rodney wasn't looking to get thrashed, he kept his observations to himself.

"Yes, Sir."

Sheppard turned back to his own lap top. "Find me something like the Asgard plasma beam weapons and I'll create an Atlantis medal of honor and give it to you, okay?"

Hiding a smile, Rodney started searching for beam weapons.

Rodney, Sheppard and Namin had MREs for dinner, and it was a little past midnight when Sheppard looked up from his laptop. "Namin, go get some sack time," he said. "I know you're dedicated, but I want you alert during the days."

"Go," Rodney said. "If you could manage to get some sleep for me too, that'd be great."

"There is a lot I can do for you," Namin said with a small smile. "Unfortunately...." He shut down the console he'd been using and headed for the door.

"Good night, Colonel, Rodney."

"Night," Rodney said.

"You got lucky there," Sheppard said after the door closed.

"I really did," Rodney said. "When things are settled again, I want a different day guard. I'll keep training with Namin, but I really want him working with me full time."

"Just how much empire building are you going to do?"

Rodney looked up from his laptop to find Sheppard looking at him, his face unreadable.

"I have to start somewhere," Rodney said. "You've got me working on weapons systems while Jeannie's off fucking Ronon. If I'm going to be your go to science guy, I need some help."

"The key being that you're _mine_ ," Sheppard said.

"I am." Rodney shrugged a little. "This city can't do without Jeannie, but you could kick me off the East Pier tomorrow and Atlantis would be fine. Trust me, I know how it is."

"You might be a little more valuable than that," Sheppard said, and then chuckled. "But not much."

"Like I said, I know."

As Rodney turned back to his work, he found himself wondering if Sheppard would miss him if he did end up taking that short walk off the long pier.

Sheppard finally made Rodney close up shop around two-thirty and Rodney was sound asleep by three. The alarm went off at seven the next morning and Rodney gave Sheppard a quick blow job, poured himself a cup of coffee and headed off to his lab.

"Namin and I are doing some work for the colonel," he said to Philips and Mullins as he grabbed a handful of MREs from the box. "So I'll be elsewhere for a while. Just...just keep your heads down and, I don't know, play solitaire or watch movies or something."

The next week passed in roughly the same fashion. Namin was actually the one to find the drone manufacturing set up as well as a secondary supply of regular drones. Rodney made sure to thank him before setting him on the trail of a vaguely worded reference to a beam weapon.

Two days after they found the ZPMs, Sheppard had pointed at the medicine cupboard as he and Rodney got ready to face another day. "There's a bottle of stims in there. You can use them, but try to be careful."

After that, Rodney hardly saw Sheppard. Namin kept him up to date on the transfer of the Athosians and other natives from the mainland to the mining site. As accustomed to hurried migrations as they were, the Athosians and their allies went where they were sent without any real problem.

"Are people upset?" he asked one afternoon while they ate lunch.

"A few," Namin said, making a face at the MRE in front of him. "But what is that phrase Dr. Mullins uses? When Teyla says jump, our people ask 'how high?'" He shrugged. "As for the rest of the refugees...well, everyone thinks they're being moved because the Wraith are about to attack; they're just glad we didn't just abandon them."

"Do they think we'd do that?"

"It's a pretty common way to get rid of undesirables," Namin said.

"Kind of wasteful," Rodney said. "At least it would be for us. We're going to need people once we've cut our last tie with Earth."

"Someone will have to see that we are fed," Namin agreed, and they both went back to their work.

Sheppard came in a couple of times a day, once around midday to check on Rodney's progress and then again in the middle of the night to drag Rodney off to bed. One night he never showed up, and Rodney was so busy chasing down an elusive clue through the database that he didn't even notice until four in the morning when Namin started snoring at his console. Rodney just popped a few pills and kept working.

* * *

Then they were close to the deadline, and not only had Rodney gotten some sleep the night before, but he'd had a chance to take a shower as well. Sheppard had been out scouting new sites for the city and had only come to bed as Rodney was getting up. Feeling weirdly like someone's wife, Rodney dragged Sheppard into the shower and then, standing under the hot spray with him, had jerked him off. Sheppard had been unsteady on his feet as Rodney steered him toward the bed and once he was asleep Rodney radioed Ronon.

"The colonel just went to bed," he said. "Is there any chance he won't be needed for another six or seven hours?"

"Yeah, I can see that he's not disturbed."

"Thanks." Rodney was about to put his radio on standby when Ronon spoke again.

"You taking care of yourself?"

"Me? I'm okay; I'm eating and trying to grab at least a little sleep. Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm good. We'll get through this."

Vaguely reassured, Rodney slipped out quietly and headed toward the ZPM power room.

Maybe it was the sleep or maybe it was the shower or maybe the fact that Rodney skipped the stims when he had his second cup of coffee or maybe it was even just luck, but right around eleven, when he was debating the merits of a fourth cup of coffee over a big glass of water, the words "remote drone" caught his eyes.

"Jesus fucking Christ," he said. "All this time and I've been chasing drones again?" He was about to leave the current directory when he realized he'd read the words wrong. _Remote weapons drone...is that "platform"? Oh my God...._

He switched over to his tablet and its link to the Expedition database, hurriedly looking for everything they had on the remote weapons platform they'd used against the Wraith just before the siege in that first year, and yes, there it was. He went back to the Ancient database again, translating the English to Ancient in his head without even thinking about it as he checked and then double checked his findings.

"If this is a fucking experimental system or broken or...."

But no; once he knew what commands to enter into the city's systems, a new interface came up. The power and readiness lights were amber and his stomach twisted until he realized that all the system needed was power. It didn't even require a whole ZPM; like the weapons platform, they could probably power it with a naquadah generator or the mostly depleted ZPM.

"I need a drive," he said without looking up. "The biggest empty one we've got."

A moment later, Namin handed him a flash drive and Rodney almost broke it as he shoved it into the USB port on his laptop.

"What...?"

"I need to tell Sheppard first," Rodney said, holding up a hand. "Just give me a minute and then...."

"Rodney...."

"Shut up!"'

"Rodney!" Namin all but yelled. Startled, Rodney stared at him. "Listen to me. We are locked in here with protection out in the halls because the colonel does not want anyone to know that we have a new ZPM."

"I know that...oh. Right. I need to calm down."

"You _really_ need to calm down." Namin said. "Breathe...put your head down if you need to, take deep breaths, and let the information finish loading." He rested a hand on Rodney's back.

"Okay. Yeah...this is...okay, no. Don't think about it. Calm. I need to be calm." Rodney gulped in air and did his best to slow himself down a little.

Twenty minutes later, the stick burning a hole in his pocket, Rodney made his way to his quarters with Namin next to him. Even though he was doing his best to not look like anything important was going on, Rodney was sure everyone looking at him could tell that he had amazing news.

Finally, Namin peeled off, joining Sheppard's Athosian guard, and Rodney heaved a huge sigh as he heard the door slide shut behind him. All of a sudden, all his calm vanished and he headed toward the bed, pulling the stick from his pocket.

"John," he said, only barely keeping himself from grabbing Sheppard's shoulder. "John, wake up!"

"I'm awake," Sheppard said, rolling over to look at the clock while he reached under his pillow for his Beretta. "They can't have reached Pegasus yet. Not for another day, at least."

"John," Rodney said again, waving the stick. "I found it!"

"Rodney, calm the fuck down and tell me what's going on."

"Remember the weapons platform? That you used against the Wraith during the Siege back in...."

"Yes," Sheppard began.

"That was an early thing...." Rodney bounced on his toes. "It took me forever to find it, but there's a remote control platform thingy that is stored here on Atlantis. Actually, there's more than one, but there's only one ready to use--but it's got a version of the beam weapon used on the Lagrange platform."

"A remote control beam weapons platform?"

"Yeah, it's about the size of a jumper and it's got a cloak. You can maneuver it using a console,   
or, I think, the chair. It's independent of the city."

"Jesus...." Sheppard let out a breath in a huff and then stared at Rodney's hand. "You have the specs?"

"Yeah," Rodney said, pulling his laptop out of his bag. "No one knows about this but you and me. Even Namin just knows that I found something that made me hyperventilate, but that's it."

"You didn't dash over here, did you?"

"No," Rodney said, tapping his fingers on the wrist rest of his laptop as he waited for it to boot up. "Although, to be fair, it took Namin and some deep breathing before I was able to nonchalantly make my way over here...oh hey, here we go."

"No more fucking coffee for you," Sheppard said as Rodney settled on the bed, turning the laptop so Sheppard could see it.

"Actually, I could really use some food that isn't an MRE," Rodney said, suddenly aware of his hunger.

"We're done with the support staff; the kitchen's safe, so you can send Namin for sandwiches."

By the time Namin returned with a tray full of food, both Rodney and Sheppard were bent over the laptop all but oblivious to the information on the screen. Rodney finally looked away when his stomach growled loudly.

"Get Jeannie," John said about an hour later. "Tell her to get over here as soon as possible. We need to get this powered up so I can start practicing it with it."

"If we power something this big up, people are going to know...."

"The only people left on Atlantis are people who are, as near as we can tell with drugs and other types of questioning, loyal to the city."

"What about everyone else?"

"Didn't I tell you? The State loyalists are locked up in the barracks on Bespin. The actual traitors--the spies--are down in detention."

"If you told me, I probably forgot," Rodney said through a large mouthful of sandwich. "It's not that I'm dreaming in Ancient, it's that I'm dreaming in Ancient text."

"You need some real sleep."

"So do you, Sir. I'm sorry I woke you up."

"If you hadn't, I'd beat the hell out of you and not in a fun way either." Sheppard turned back to the laptop. "Call Jeannie and then finish your sandwich."

Jeannie looked almost as bad as Sheppard had earlier that morning, and she was far grumpier than he'd been.

"Give it a rest, McKay," Sheppard said, "and check this out."

"What the hell...." Her voice trailed off as she took in the remote. "You found this, Mer?"

"Yeah," Rodney said cautiously.

"Interesting," she said. "I had no idea...well, never mind. I assume you want it powered up?"

"Yeah, and we need to look it over to make sure it's still okay." Sheppard said.

Rodney almost protested--after all, he'd found the thing--but Sheppard gave him a look and he sighed and reached for the other half of his sandwich. It was stupid; Jeannie was obviously much better with Ancient power systems and actual hardware, but still...Rodney wanted to be there.

 _Not with about a week left before Earth throws their best at us. Later, you'll have time to learn how to do this stuff later._

"Hang on," Sheppard said, as Jeannie headed toward the door. "Give us a minute."

Rodney was a little surprised when she just nodded and left. "She must be even more tired than she looks," he said.

"Two things," Sheppard said. "One...." He grinned at Rodney. "Thank you; I'll have someone design a medal." In spite of his words, he sounded sincere and Rodney ducked his head.

"I want to survive, too," he said. Sheppard just nodded.

"Two," and now Sheppard looked a lot more serious. "I don't want you to spend the rest of your life doing database searches. Just because you're good at it and just because your searches have probably saved our asses three times over doesn't mean that you won't be good at the hardware stuff as well."

"I was just telling myself that," Rodney said. "But thank you."

"You looked pissed off," Sheppard said. "Don't be. You'll get recognition and training, I promise you that." He looked down at Rodney. "I'll see you later, but for now, just take the afternoon and relax."

"Yeah," Rodney said. "Okay."

As soon as Sheppard left, leaving his lunch behind, Rodney called Namin inside. "Here, have a sandwich and some fruit."

"Thanks," Namin wolfed his food down and then looked at Rodney. "Now what?"

"I guess we wait. The colonel told me to take the afternoon off, so I figured you might as well take a break, and anyway, I wanted to talk to you."

"Yes?"

"I talked to Teyla a little about this and I wanted to ask you...do you want to keep doing database work for me? Because it's kind of ridiculous to expect you to both guard me and work on the stuff in the lab too."

"As long as I can make sure your bodyguards are good," Namin said seriously, and for a moment Rodney wanted to laugh. He was sixteen and Namin was seventeen and...well, they sounded a little like Colonel Sheppard and Ronon.

"Okay," he said. "I wouldn't want anyone guarding me that you don't approve of anyway. So when things are back to...well, whatever will pass for normal around here, we'll talk to Teyla and maybe Ronon and see about getting you some more help."

And now, finally, he laughed. "It's just," he said when Namin gave him a look. "If we were two ordinary people back on Earth, we'd still be in school. And damn, if I'd had you watching my back in high school I wouldn't have gotten the crap kicked out of me as much as I did."

"You'd hold your own against anyone now."

"Yeah." Rodney shook his head. "It's weird. I can fight, but my real contribution will be...oh hey, that thing, I found? It's a remote control weapons platform...."

They spent the rest of the afternoon talking about Atlantis's various weapons systems, and although Sheppard would probably call it work, Rodney found it oddly relaxing.

Sheppard didn't return until after midnight. Rodney had sent Namin off to bed and had settled down with Sheppard's copy of _War and Peace_ , because he was too drained to study but really didn't feel like playing solitaire or chess against the computer. The book was kind of boring, and Rodney had just nodded off when the door opened.

"Hey," he said. "Is there any chance of you getting a decent night's sleep tonight?"

"I'm about three seconds from face-planting right here in the doorway," Sheppard said. He stumbled over to the bed and sat down heavily. "Please tell me I don't stink."

"Not so much that it'll keep either of us from sleeping," Rodney said. He slid out of bed and knelt down to help Sheppard out of his boots. "How'd it go?"

"Pretty well. Jeannie thinks the mostly depleted ZPM from Larish will be more than enough to power the remote platform, so she won't have to scramble to set up a naquadah generator in the little time we have."

"Oh, good."

"Yeah, tomorrow she's going back to working on the city's shields and I'll be test driving the remote platform. It may look like a jumper, but the engines aren't nearly as powerful. It's probably going to have all the handling power of a late 60s Caddy."

He managed the rest of his clothes on his own and then flopped down onto the bed. Rodney reached over and dimmed his bedside lamp.

"These kind of battle tactics aren't my strength. It's not the kind of thing the Air Force trained me to do," Sheppard said, several moments later. "I have an idea, and I think it will work, but how well it works depends on who they send. I'm hoping for Carter."

"Oh? Dr. Mullins has talked about her some; isn't she like the best the SGC's got?"

"Yeah, you could say that. Jeannie hates her. Near as I can tell, they got into it a few years ago, and that's at least one of the reasons Jeannie got sent here with the rest of us bad boys and girls."

"Then why are you hoping for her?"

"If your sister could save her life by surrendering a ship, do you think she'd do it?"

Rodney finally put his book down and looked at Sheppard. "Probably, why?"

"Because Carter's military, but she's a scientist first. Caldwell or Ellis, if he's even still around, would probably blow the whole ship up or force me to do it rather than surrendering." Sheppard shrugged. "It's what I would do."

"And you want to capture the ship?"

"If I can. Yes, I can fly Atlantis, but she's more like a flying fortress than a warship. Your remote platform will help, and the super drones will help, but she's not exactly maneuverable. A ship with Asgard technology would be...." He paused.

"What?"

"I was going to say it would be the best thing that happened to us, but I'm not entirely sure that's right."

"Oh?"

"It's a double-edged sword. If Earth knows we have a ship, one of their ships, then we're far more dangerous in their eyes."

"You really don't think they worry about us flying the city back to Earth?" Rodney asked.

"I don't know," Sheppard replied. "I wish the main spy here on Atlantis had been just about anyone other than the fucking Quartermaster." When Rodney raised an eyebrow, Sheppard continued.

"Linder didn't know or care about tactics and had no idea what sorts of tactics Earth thought we'd use." He sighed and fell silent for so long that Rodney wondered if the conversation was over.

"I don't want to get us all killed," Sheppard finally said.

"You won't." Rodney said, without even thinking about it. "And before you ask," he added, "no, I'm not just saying that because it's what you want to hear. And I'm far from the only one who thinks it; look at how many people stayed."

"Yeah."

Sheppard rolled over and his breathing started to even out. Rodney had just gotten back into the scene he'd been reading earlier when he heard Sheppard say, very faintly, "thanks."

* * *

Rodney woke up before Sheppard did and was just finishing up in the bathroom when he heard Sheppard talking. "Okay, thanks for the information. Can you tell Majors Jordan and Teldy, as well as my team and Elizabeth, that I'd like to meet at...say ten hundred?"

"What's up?" Rodney asked as Sheppard set his radio back down onto the night stand.

"Our long range sensors picked up a ship; it's a Prometheus class and it's headed our way." If Sheppard still felt any of the doubt he'd expressed the night before, he'd buried it deep. The only expression on his face now was determination.

"How long do we have?"

"Five days."

"Okay, then," Rodney said. "You have time to take a shower before your meeting. You might want to shave, too."

"Bossy."

"Sorry, but you are getting a little shaggy." Rodney rubbed his own chin; he'd been surprised at how scruffy he'd gotten after four or five days without shaving.

"I dunno: now that I'm a glamorous rebel, maybe I should let the beard go and get an eye patch."

Rodney pretended to think about it but then shook his head. "No, I really don't think so."

"Yeah," Sheppard said. "And it itches, too." He got up and stripped off his t-shirt and boxers. "Order some breakfast, would you?"

As the shower started up, Rodney set up the coffee pot. They had enough coffee to get them all through the coming confrontation, but after that, it would be nothing but weird Pegasus teas. Pushing the thought aside, he called to the mess hall and then tidied up the bedroom. If he was going to be relegated to the supportive boyfriend role--and God, even thinking about it semi-seriously was weird--then he might as well do a decent job of it.

"Speaking of which," he said as Sheppard wandered out of the bathroom wearing only a towel. "Once this is over, we need to move."

"Speaking of what?"

Rodney made a dismissive gesture. "I was just thinking that this place is ridiculously small for one person, let alone two."

"Well, with more power I guess we could open up some of the residential areas." Sheppard shrugged and sat down at his desk.

"Perfect example," Rodney said. "We eat at our desks."

"You're not turning into my mother, are you?"

"Um...sorry?"

"Frankly, you can get us a new place and decorate it in high style for all I care. Just don't take up heavy drinking."

"I get hangovers," Rodney said. "Really bad ones, with migraines."

"So did my mother," Sheppard said, digging into his food. "Never stopped her."

There was a long silence. "Well," Sheppard said, with a grimace. "This is awkward."

"Sorry," Rodney said again.

"Don't be." Sheppard ate some toast. "I'd let you sit in the meeting today, but Jordan and Teldy still tend to think of you as my distracting pet, so..."

"It's okay," Rodney said. "I'll find something to do, even if it's just sit around and read _War and Peace_."

"Don't spoil it for me; I've only gotten to the third chapter."

"I hate to tell you, but Napoleon's plans to conquer Russia fail."

Sheppard burst out laughing and Rodney grinned at him.

* * *

The role of the supportive boyfriend was pretty boring, Rodney discovered over the next four days. In addition to practicing with the remote, Sheppard was all over the city, meeting with people and planning out the battle. Rodney did his best to make sure Sheppard ate and got as much sleep as possible, but that was as far as it went.

Most of the non-essential personnel were sent to Bespin, so he didn't even have Doctor Mullins or Corporal Phillips to spend time with He and Namin spent a fair amount of time in AR-1's private gym, and when they weren't working out or doing the katas Namin had been trying to teach Rodney, they hung out in Rodney's lab, searching the Ancient database for entertainment facilities and porn.

They found a pool complex but nothing in the way of porn, leaving Rodney to wonder what the hell the Ancients did for fun. "Maybe there's literature," he said, but the thought of reading something in Ancient for fun was just too much like work.

Their one big find were some strategy games. They were a bit too complicated for just relaxing, but Rodney earmarked them for later; maybe Sheppard or some of the Marines would be interested.

And then, suddenly, they had a day left or maybe less.

"Pack your things," Sheppard said, 18 hours before the earliest ETA they'd calculated for the _Daedalus_. "I'm sending you to...."

"No."

Sheppard frowned, but Rodney crossed his arms over his chest and did his best to look resolved.

"I don't care if all I do is sit in my lab and follow the battle on the sensors, I am _not_ leaving."

"If I make it a very clear, direct order?"

"Please," Rodney said. "Don't."

Sighing, Sheppard shook his head. "Fine, but don't make a habit of disobeying me."

"I won't, Sir."

That night, they ate in the mess hall with everyone who was remaining on Atlantis. It was a quiet affair; the only scientists who remained were Jeannie and her most trusted engineers. Dr. Weir was there along with a small scattering of support staff and, of course, Keller and almost all of her people.

The kitchen staff had gone all out, perhaps because they were feeding fewer people than usual, and Rodney noticed the medics circulating the tables and urging everyone to eat up.

"It's weird," Ronon said.

"Oh?" Dr. Weir asked. She was sitting with the team in a clear show of solidarity, which Rodney understood but still found a little uncomfortable.

"It feels like the night before a battle, but none of us except Sheppard will be fighting."

"I'll be fighting to keep everything powered up," Jeannie said. She leaned in closer and when she continued, her voice was low. "And fine, John's got a pretty clever plan, but there are a lot of ways it can go wrong."

"Yeah," Sheppard said. "Buck up, you could be manning a rail gun this time tomorrow."

"I feel better already," Ronon said dryly.

"Teyla," Dr. Weir said a little while later. "Do you want to address everyone? Or do you, John?"

"I think one of you should," Teyla said. "You are the ones leaving your world behind."

"Fuck," Sheppard said. "I suck at this kind of thing."

"They aren't here because they trust me," Elizabeth said. "They're here for you,   
Colonel."

Taking a deep breath, Sheppard closed his eyes and sat that way for a long moment. "Not just me, but yeah, okay," he finally said. "I'll do it."

Ronon promptly stood up, put two fingers in his mouth and whistled loudly. "Listen to the commander," he shouted as the room quieted down.

"You're going to have to work a little harder to hear me," Sheppard said, and people chuckled.

"When Teyla said one of us should speak, I was kind of hoping it wouldn't be me. I'm crap at this sort of thing."

There were a few more chuckles and then the room went silent. Rodney could almost feel the tension that everyone had hidden all evening under steaks and fries and jokes coming to the surface.

"When we came to Atlantis, we came for a lot of reasons, but we all had one thing in common--we all knew there was no going home. Oh, maybe we pretended that we could go back someday, but when we really thought about it, we knew we'd been sent here because Earth didn't want us. Some of us were criminals or knew criminals, some of us had made dangerous enemies, and some of us just didn't have anywhere else on Earth to go.

"So here we were, in another galaxy untold light-years from the home that no longer wanted us. And somewhere along the line, we came to understand something. Maybe for you that understanding came gradually, or maybe it came in a sudden flash of insight. Maybe you didn't even understand it until we pulled you in for questioning last week.

"However it happened, we all understand one thing. In our time here, Atlantis has become our home. Our place. Our city."

Sheppard paused and Rodney couldn't look away from him.

"They're coming tomorrow because they don't want us to feel like that. They don't want us to have any home but the one they kicked us out of. And yes, they are coming tomorrow to try to take our city away from us."

And then, instead of squaring his shoulders back and lifting his chin to look heroic, Sheppard shrugged.

"They can try all they want, but I'm not going to let them succeed," he said, simply and matter-of-factly. When people started reacting-clapping and yelling "hell no!"--he held up his hand.

"You know why?" And now he was standing in a straight, defiant pose.

"Because this is my city-- _our city_. They can send the _Daedalus_ ; they can send the _Apollo_ ; they can send the _Odyssey_. Hell, they can build a whole fleet of ships and send them after us, but it won't change the outcome at all.

"We will defeat them and we will hold what's ours and as long as I live, _no one_ will take it from us!"

When the cheering and the stomping started, Rodney jumped to his feet and yelled along with everyone else, so he didn't see who started the steady chant of "Shepp-ard, Shepp-ard, Shepp-ard!"

He chimed in, his eyes on Sheppard and he could see it hit him, could see him take in the adulation and the devotion with what looked at first like confusion and then changed into a fierce kind of pride and determination. Rodney wanted him so much right then that it was hard to remember why he couldn't just crawl under the table and suck him off.

After everyone calmed down, which took a while, even the announcement from the remaining kitchen staff that there were brownies, didn't make much of an impression on Rodney. He ate his brownie without really thinking about the fact that it might have been made with the last chocolate in the city. And then, everyone was saying good night and Sheppard had talked over the night watch with Teldy and Campbell and _finally_ Sheppard's hand was clamped around Rodney's arm and he was all but dragging him down the hall.

They hadn't had time for much in the way of sex in the last few weeks; it had been mostly blowjobs and handjobs here and there with none of the complicated scenes Sheppard liked. Rodney half expected Sheppard to go for the foot locker of toys for a whip or a paddle or even just the cuffs.

But no, Sheppard laid Rodney out on the bed and looked him for a long moment.

"Who do you belong to?" he finally said, sitting down on the bed.

"You, Commander," Rodney said.

"Me," Sheppard said with that same fierce look. "Only me." He bent down and bit down on the sensitive skin stretched over Rodney's hipbone while sliding his fingers down Rodney's to pinch hard right behind Rodney's knee.

"No one but you," Rodney promised. It was true, he realized with some surprise. Sheppard was biting him and pinching up bruises and it hurt like fuck and, honestly, Rodney couldn't imagine being with anyone else.

By the time Sheppard pushed into him, Rodney had over a dozen bite marks and bruises on him and the resulting endorphins made his whole body hum. Sheppard had him on his hands and knees, and when he tried to push back, tried to get Sheppard to fuck him harder, Sheppard held him still.

"Please," Rodney moaned. "Please please please, sir!"

Sheppard slinging an arm around Rodney's waist was all the warning Rodney got; he braced himself as Sheppard sat up and back, pulling Rodney into his lap.

Rodney loved this position; in some ways it felt more intimate than fucking face to face. Sheppard's chest was warm against Rodney's back and his arms were tight around Rodney's waist and chest, holding him close. He leaned his head back on Sheppard's shoulder and sure enough, Sheppard bent his head and bit Rodney's neck, right above the collar.

"Yours," Rodney said as Sheppard began to fuck him. "All yours."

"Mine," Sheppard growled. He took his time, fucking Rodney slow and so deep Rodney would be feeling it for days. And he made Rodney wait until Rodney was so hard it hurt, until his whole body shook and his nipples ached where Sheppard had been playing with them and each bruise or bite felt like a pinprick of fire.

"Please," Rodney gasped. "Please please...oh God, please, Sir."

"You want it?"

"Yes...fuck...please let me come...please...."

"Who do you belong to?"

"You, John." It was hard to string words together, but Rodney had a sudden, brilliant idea. "Yours," he said. "I'm yours, Commander."

"Fuck," Sheppard grunted. He pushed up hard and pulled Rodney down at the same time. "Do it!"

Rodney came so hard he almost blacked out. "Yours," he mumbled as he felt Sheppard come. "All yours."

Later, as he rolled over and tried to fall asleep, Rodney winced as he put pressure on one of the bruises on his hip. Shivering a little, he pressed down on the bite mark on the inside of his arm and hoped to hell that they'd live to do this again some other night.

* * *

John hadn't expected to sleep, but to his surprise, when he rolled over and looked at the clock, he'd managed to get about five hours. He'd tried to give everyone who was off duty seven hours to sleep--or to try to sleep or to fuck or whatever--but still, he got up quietly and pulled on his uniform, trying not to wake Rodney.

He managed it and for a long moment, he stood, looking down at the boy in his bed. Rodney had marks and bruises all over his body, several of them visible, and John couldn't help remembering Rodney moaning "yours" over and over last night, his voice breathless with pain and need.

"Good boy," John murmured now. "My boy."

He waited a moment, but if Rodney wasn't really asleep, he was doing an excellent job of faking it. With a faint smile, John left their quarters and headed for the mess hall.

It was mostly empty, although a couple of the civilian support staff were on hand with food and pots of coffee. Early on in his military career, John had learned that he fought and flew better on a fairly empty stomach and without caffeine jitters, so he grabbed a warm muffin and a bottle of water and took them with him as he headed for the gate room.

Half the morning shift was already there; John nodded to them and paused to check the most recent sensor data with Campbell. There wasn't anything new, they couldn't track the Earth ship in hyperspace, but based on the last reading they had, there was no real way for the ship to arrive any sooner than five hours from now.

Elizabeth was in her office, a plate of untouched eggs and bacon in front of her.

"You did well last night," she said. The smile she gave him seemed genuine and he shrugged a little.

"You'd have probably done better."

"I would have been more polished," she said. "But you weren't addressing potential allies or politicians; you gave them what they needed to hear."

"Thanks," he said. "I've been meaning to ask you...could you write something up for us to send back through to Earth when we contact them later? I'm planning on sending the loyalists back alive and the other spies back dead, but I think some kind of formal declaration of intent would be a good idea."

She nodded. "I've actually been drafting something. Once the battle is over, I'll go over it with you."

"Good," he said. "Thanks," he added, figuring a little courtesy now could go a long way.

As he turned to go, she spoke. "John? Good luck."

When he looked back in surprise, she had turned to her computer, her fingers already busy on the keyboard.

 _Interesting,_ he thought as he headed out of her office.

He looked in on the defense stations--they still had the rail guns that had been placed during the Wraith siege--and then made his way to the infirmary to check in on Keller. She looked a little scared, but appeared to have things under control, so he just ducked into her office and used his override code on the security drug cabinet without pulling her away from the conversation she was having with her nurses.

He tucked the foil-wrapped pills into his shirt pocket and then thought about it for a moment before grabbing another two doses. When he came out of the office, Keller gave him a knowing look, but she didn't say anything, so he just nodded at her before pausing to chat with some of her people.

Ronon was waiting for him when he left the infirmary.

"Where the hell have you been? And where's your guard?"

John rolled his eyes. "And people say I'm the paranoid one. All the Marines have more important things to do and almost all the Athosians are overseeing the people on Bespin." Even though there was no one in the hallway, he lowered his voice. "And I thought it would make me look more confident in my people if I didn't have anyone watching my back."

"Tough," Ronon said. "I'll be with you for the rest of the day."

"It's possible I was counting on that." John jerked his thumb back at the infirmary. "You need....?"

"Nah, I have knives."

Rodney and Namin weren't in John's quarters when he checked back in, but he found them in Rodney's lab. Rodney was in the middle of rigging one of the Ancient screens to show the 'Lantean systems sensor data when John and Ronon walked in the door.

"I thought we'd make some popcorn," he said. He was obviously trying to be nonchalant, but the corners of his mouth and eyes were tight. "Watch the show."

John reached for his arm, pleased when Rodney winced a little as John put pressure on some of his bruises. Pulling Rodney into a corner, he thought about trying one more time to convince him to go to Bespin, but no, they'd covered that last night.

"Here," he said instead, handing Rodney the two extra foil packets.

"What's this?" Rodney said.

"Cyanide," John said. "Standard issue for officers. You don't have to take it; I think if you were somehow captured, you'd be able to convince them that you were coerced."

Rodney took the pills, reading the small lettering on the foil. "This is two doses."

"They might let you live, but not Namin. Suicide in the face of capture is pretty common here in Pegasus, but I don't know what kind of plans he might have made."

"Oh." Rodney stared at the pills for another moment and then shoved them into his pockets. "Look," he said, suddenly earnest and a little scared. "I'm...just...oh, fuck. Try not to die, okay?"

"I'll do my best, I promise," John said.

After gripping Rodney's shoulder tightly, he was turning to leave when Rodney spoke again.

"Colonel?"

"Yeah?"

"You must have gotten somewhere with me," he said with a crooked little smile. "I'd blow the ship up too."

"That's my boy."

John swung through the gate room again after leaving Rodney's lab. Teyla was there now, settled in next to Campbell. It was her job to coordinate between the gate room and the chair room; while John would be able to tap into the sensors once he was in the chair, he'd learned that juggling weapons systems, defense systems and the sensors was exhausting. Having Teyla take one of those tasks over would make a huge difference.

"I have told my people how little the people on Earth value them," she said quietly, after they'd gone over the battle plans one more time. "We know how important this battle is, not just to those of us here in the city."

"Because I needed more riding on my shoulders," John said.

"One more reason to defeat them," she said firmly. John nodded, knowing she was feeling the same frustration Ronon and the Marines and other fighters in the city were. They'd all rather be on the front lines with weapons in hand, but this battle was largely John's to fight. Thinking about it that way, he felt his concerns begin to fade way. They were replaced by eagerness; he was finally ready to get this started.

The feeling grew as he finally made his way to the chair room. By the time he arrived, his concentration was narrowing down to the battle plan and his role in it.

"It's about time you joined us," Jeannie said, glancing up from the console she was leaning over. Her eyes were bright and her movements a little jerky, but John wasn't too worried; Jeannie did some of her best work under the influence of uppers.

"Everything in place?"

"Yeah," she said, looking around the room. "The cloaked jumper is down on the ocean floor and its systems and the weapon platform remote are powered and ready to go. Simpson is in the ZPM power room, but for once we don't really have to worry about power consumption."

"Yeah," John said. "Just as long as we don't overload anything."

"You're a fucking ray of sunshine, you know that?"

"I do my best." Taking a deep breath, he approached the chair. "Okay, let's do this."

Even if John hadn't known about the two new ZPMs before he sat down in the chair, he would have known as soon as the mental interface kicked in. For once, being in the chair was like being in a powered up jumper, all potential and information and cool power thrumming just behind his eyes.

After a moment spent adjusting to the awesome power thrumming through the chair, he opened his eyes tapped his radio three times, activating the secure channel to Jumper Five.

"You have a go, Fremantle."

"Copy, Colonel. Launching now."

John could feel the jumper pulling away from the city as he was shedding a little piece of himself and he shivered a little. It was disturbing; he could easily get lost here in the city's systems if he wasn't careful. With a thought, he brought up the city wide communication system.

"All right, people, this is Colonel Sheppard. I'm bringing up the impulse drive."

The drive responded to his command as easily as the communication system had and the whole city shivered as the impulse engines came up to full power. He'd tested them the day before, but not from the chair, and it felt completely different, almost like the city was straining to lift of from the surface of the ocean.

Something about that eagerness felt familiar, and for a moment John tried to place the feeling. He was used to power at his command but this was like the first time he'd tried to ride Loki, his mother's favorite hunter. He'd sneaked out to the stables one morning and Loki had wanted to run and run hard. John had stayed on him and then, later, taken his father's beating without crying.

He'd learned after that, and now he reined in Atlantis the same way he'd reined in overeager horses. _Good girl,_ he thought, even though the city wasn't really sentient and didn't pay any attention to extemporaneous chatter.

"You're at full power to both impulse engines and the shields," Jeannie said at the same time the city put the information in John's head.

"We have full power," he repeated to the city's communications. "Lifting in five, four, three, two...lift off. We have lift off!"

The city gave a sharp shudder as it left the surface of 'Lantea's ocean and then fought to rise against the atmosphere and the planet's gravity. The impulse engines were up to the task, but it wasn't exactly fast; in fact, it reminded John of flying a heavily loaded Blackhawk. It gave him time, however, to bring up the shields and carefully maneuver Atlantis toward the position he wanted--a high geosynchronous orbit that would give him command of half the planet.

"We have achieved orbit," he announced. "All personnel to their interior positions, the shields will be dropped in five minutes. I repeat, shields down in five minutes."

He heard people reporting their positions to Teyla, but he didn't need the information; with the amount of power they had, the placement of every single life sign in the city was apparent to him, and he knew it was safe to drop the shields a full three minutes before he had planned.

After the shields came down, John cut the impulse engines and the city went silent and John checked their position--it was holding--and then turned his attention to Jeannie. This was the moment of truth; his whole battle plan rested on it.

"How's the jumper holding out?"

Jeannie didn't even look up from her console. "I'm going to bring it up now...."

The city's sensors caught it immediately: for a moment a familiar energy signature showed on the ocean's surface, as if Atlantis was still there, and then it was almost gone, leaving a faint ghost of a presence.

"Looks good," Jeannie said. "I don't know if the _Daedalus_ or whoever will be able to see it or not, but if they're looking for the kind of energy traces a cloaked city would give off, they'll see them right where Atlantis was sitting."

John let out a quick sigh of relief. Jeannie had busted her ass to set up something that would project an imitation of a cloaked city on the surface of the ocean. It was the logical thing for Atlantis to do, hide from the Earth ship, particularly after all the work Jeannie and her department had done in the last few years combining the shield and the cloak so that they no longer canceled each other out, work the SGC was well aware of.

"Good work," John said, turning his attention back to the city's systems. "I'm releasing the remote weapons platform now."

The platform was cloaked with the same kind of cloak the jumpers used, but it was easy enough for John to follow it as he maneuvered it into an orbit far from the city's position. He checked his simplified map of the planet and surrounding space again--the weapons platform, the faked city on the ocean's surface, and Atlantis herself formed a **V** whose point was the faked city--and then let the chair's interface go to standby.

"Freemantle, go ahead and cloak and get into position." he said, suddenly aware of the room again. "As soon as the enemy appears, I want you stuck on them like a burr."

After acknowledging Freemantle's response, John went back to the city-wide communications.

"We're in position and all systems are go. So now...we wait." He let his connection to the city fade and then sat up, the chair going dark as he shut it down.

"Hey," Ronon said. "Eat something and drink some water."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," John said, but he took the sandwich Ronon offered and ate it with half a bottle of water.

"How you doing, McKay?" John asked, turning to catch her swallowing a pill.

"I'm good," she said. "I'll crash for a week, but not until this is over, I promise."

"Good enough for me." He touched his radio. "Teyla? You making sure the troops take their breaks?''

"Yes, John," she replied. "The support staff is going around with food and water now. Elizabeth tells me that the appropriate phrase is 'confidence is high.'"

"Glad to hear it."

John waited until he ducked into the bathroom to take a piss before he called Rodney.

"How're you two holding out down there?"

"We're fine," Rodney said. "Interesting strategy; I thought you said you didn't know anything about tactics."

"I don't, but I can be a sneaky fucker."

"Make that a _mean_ sneaky fucker," Rodney said with a chuckle.

"After this is over, I'm going to show you mean like you've never seen it."

"God," Rodney said, a little breathlessly. "You're unbelievable. Um...in a totally hot, good way. Sir."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Hold that thought."

"I will. Good luck, John."

"Thanks," John said.

It was absurd, but he found himself smiling just a little when he settled back into the chair.

An hour passed, and then another, while John did his best to keep from going crazy. He chased some intriguing information down in the city systems, but mostly he went over his battle plan over and over, more and more sure that he wasn't going to be able to capture the enemy ship.

 _Enemy ship,_ he thought, wondering when he'd really started thinking of Earth that way. Probably even before Lorne's coup attempt, maybe even before he'd left Earth itself. John had never been particularly patriotic. While he'd known all his adult life that the strong arm of the State was better than chaos, he'd grown up close enough to the center of power to be cynical about the people who actually ran the State.

Dave had been the one destined for politics while John had been expected to run the business, and so John had never really thought about what he would change if he were involved in running the State. Now, however, he was going to be in a position to set up some kind of new government, and while he had no idea what to do, he was beginning to know what he wanted.

It was nebulous, but he knew that first of all the Wraith had to go so his people, his city, could be safe and prosperous, and maybe, with the careful introduction of trusted allies, grow. It would take time, but they had power now, and perhaps they could find more ZPMs and learn even more about Atlantis. The city hummed under his fingers as he thought about its potential and all of a sudden, he was furious with Earth, with the State.

Now that the city was truly his, now that they had severed their ties with the world that, as he'd said the night before, no longer wanted them, he was eager to start over, to build something strong and lasting here in Pegasus.

 _Come on,_ he thought. _Get here so I can blow you the fuck out of my sky and move on._

Twenty-five minutes later, the _Daedalus_ finally obliged him, and while he'd been hoping for the _Apollo_ under Carter's command, there was something fitting about it being Caldwell he faced. Caldwell who had done his best via back channels and dirty dealing to take Atlantis away from John. Caldwell who'd been careless enough to get himself snaked by the Goa'uld and had still managed to not only hold on to his command but continuously imply that he thought John was a disgrace to the uniform.

 _Fuck you,_ John thought, fighting to keep from just firing on the ship the moment she dropped out of hyperspace.

Instead, he listened in as Caldwell initiated contact and started attempting to bargain with Elizabeth. There was nothing he could offer, and John was pleased when Elizabeth stood strong and refused every offer Caldwell made.

All while they were verbally sparring, all while the _Daedalus_ was scanning the ocean, Jeannie was directing Atlantis's own sensors in a search for weak spots in the _Daedalus's_ own shields.

"They don't have anything new," she reported while the city gave John the same information. "But damn, the life signs on the ship are...."

"Yeah," John said, his eyes narrowing as he took in the bright cluster that represented the ship's company. "That's one hell of a big occupation force."

"If we keep this up too much longer, they might find us." Jeannie said after another moment.

"Freemantle," John said, across the encrypted communication channel between Atlantis and Jumper Five. "Fire the warning shot."

The city's sensors showed one of their few super drones streaking across space to explode right off the _Daedalus's_ bow. The ship instantly fired back with intent to destroy, but John wasn't at all surprised when they missed the jumper; Freemantle was a damn good pilot.

"Caldwell," John said, trying not to sound too smug. "I've got more of those and a few other surprises. If you surrender, we'll send you, your whole crew and even all those extra passengers you're carrying back to Earth."

"Bullshit," Caldwell said, and Asgard plasma beams lashed out at the supposed site of the city.

John closed his eyes and directed the energy beam from the remote platform, before sending the platform itself moving in an evasive pattern.

It wasn't necessary.

"Holy shit," John murmured as the city's sensors relayed the data back to him. He'd aimed at the middle of the ship, just forward of the 302 bays and, from what he could tell, he'd scored a perfect hit.

Unfortunately for John's plans--and for the _Daedalus_ herself--the weapon sliced right through the ship's shields and through the hull, breaking the _Daedalus's_ back in the process. John stared in shock, awed--and more than a little turned on--by the power he'd unleashed as the two great pieces fell apart.

"My God," he heard Jeannie whisper. Still overwhelmed himself, he swiveled the chair around and saw her staring at the sensors in shock. "I...fuck," she muttered.

"Yeah," Ronon breathed, but when John looked at him, Ronon looked less shocked than Jeannie. When he realized John was watching him, he grinned tightly. "Can you imagine that up against a Wraith ship?"

"Yeah," John said, and goddamn but he wanted to see that. Another ship of enemies breaking under a weapon he directed with his mind? _Oh fuck yeah!_

Taking a deep breath, he pushed his feelings aside, ignored his erection and checked the sensors to see if any part of the ship was at all salvageable.

"What do you think, McKay?" he asked. "Anything worth saving over there?"

"Not really," she said, blinking a little as she tried to concentrate. "We already have the specs of the _Prometheus_ class ships and, apparently, we don't really need to try to salvage their weapons or the drive because our own are clearly better. As for survivors...hardly anyone's still alive."

Another thought, and a stream of drones poured out of Atlantis and blew the unshielded pieces of the ship into smaller and smaller pieces until there was nothing but a rapidly expanding cloud of metal fragments where a ship had once been.

"Dear me," Elizabeth said into the command channel. "That will make nice footage to send back to Earth."

"And if they don't get the message," John said, with a smug smile. "We'll do it again."

An hour later, after they'd collected the jumpers and the weapons platform and contacted Bespin to inform the Athosians of their victory, John set course for Atlantis's new home and put the ship into hyperdrive.

All their plans were already in place and Elizabeth was still working on their message to Earth, so John ordered everyone, aside from a small crew set to watching the ZPM power room and the gate room, to stand down and relax.

He sent Ronon off with Jeannie to watch over her while she came down from the stims and made his way to Rodney's lab. Namin took one look at him, murmured his congratulations and stepped outside of the lab.

"Here?" Rodney said. "Are you sure you don't want to...."

"Did you see it?" John said, reaching for Rodney.

"Yeah," Rodney said. He squirmed out of John's grasp and John had maybe a second or two to wonder what he was up to and then Rodney was going to his knees and reaching for John's fly. "She broke right in two," he said as he undid John's pants. "My...the drone platform snapped her in half."

"Your drone platform," John said and then he groaned as Rodney took him all the way in in one smooth glide of lips and tongue and mouth and throat. Rodney moaned and then choked, but he didn't fight it when John pulled back and then immediately shoved back in.

John had every intention of fucking Rodney later, but he didn't bother to hold back; they'd have plenty of time. "Gonna fuck you," he growled. "Gonna fuck you from here to the new planet...."

He came with the image of the _Daedalus_ breaking apart behind his eyes and the feel of Rodney's throat closing around the head of his dick.

* * *

It took them six days to reach their new planet, which was situated three quarters of the way across the galaxy--much further than they could had gotten without the new ZPM--from 'Lantea. As much as he would have liked to, John didn't spend the entire time in bed with Rodney.

In fact, he didn't spend much time in bed at all. First he had to break down the battle with his officers; while it hadn't really been much of a battle, they still needed to start thinking about how their new weapons could be used against the Wraith.

And then there were planning meetings with Elizabeth and Teyla--long sessions while they figured out short term, medium term and long term needs. Even more complicated were the meetings with what John started calling the Executive Committee--his team, Elizabeth, Keller, Jordan and Teldy--as they tried to hammer out some kind of plan to govern Atlantis and the allies, such as the Athosians, who had tied their future together with the exiles from Earth.

It was a process that would take much longer than six days, and John was relieved to sit back down in the chair and bring the city out of hyperdrive over their new planet. Landing the city was easy, and soon they were able to open everything up and breathe un-recycled air.

'Lantea Two was colder than 'Lantea, but there was enough land in the temperate zones along the equator to farm for food, and there seemed to be plenty of animal life. They'd be able to feed themselves if they needed to, although Elizabeth was already getting ready to negotiate new treaties with some of their allies.

Three days after they landed, they dialed Earth from a deserted planet by boosting a jumper's DHD with the crystal from Atlantis's DHD. Once they established communication with the SGC, John sent the recorded message he and Elizabeth had written through the wormhole.

"Stargate Command, this is Commander John Sheppard, speaking for the Atlantis Executive Committee and the people of Atlantis.

"We are dialing you from a shielded jumper on an uninhabited planet light years from 'Lantea, so don't bother sending a bomb or troops through the gate. If you choose not to believe me, the only people you'll kill will be the loyalists we'd like to send back to you. The _Daedalus_ was destroyed with all hands less than an hour after it left hyperdrive over 'Lantea. Atlantis suffered no losses in the battle.

"In exactly five minutes, we will return the loyalists, the bodies of the spies you tried to place on Atlantis, and our formal declaration of succession from the State. As we stated in our last message to you, we have no interest in Earth or in any of the planets of the Milky Way. However, while we will not return to attack Earth, we will continue to defend ourselves, using whatever force necessary, against any and all forces you send against us.

"Sheppard out."

"They'll be back," John said, much later that night. The lights were out, but he'd left the curtains open and two of New 'Lantea's three moons were in the sky.

"Yeah," Rodney said. "And you'll just have to kick their asses again and again until they get it."

" _We'll_ have to kick their asses," John said.

"Yeah," Rodney said with a laugh. "I guess we will."

 _-the end-_

**Author's Note:**

> Notes: So many people to thank! First off, my fabulous betas--Darkrose and Helens78! Without Darkrose, this story would never have happened and without Helens78, it wouldn't be nearly as good as it is now. If there are any mistakes, they're mine and not the fault of those two wonderful people.
> 
> Secondly, there were a lot of people who encouraged me, listened to me, read my whiny posts and generally cheered me on when I was ready to throw my hands up in the air and quit. Special thanks to the Usual Spatulites and to all the people who told me over and over how much they were looking forward to this story. Also, I owe thanks to "the Colonel Sadist Wallpaper Nonnie" for the fabulous wallpaper I stared at while doing the final edit. Your Colonel is truly inspiring.
> 
> Thirdly, I'm writing this before I've seen the art, but I'm confident enough to say thank you to both Fanarts_Series and Saldemonium for their wonderful art. I have to give special thanks to Sal, because over a year and a half ago, she bought my fic services at a charity auction and gave me a prompt that led to _Make the Devil Feel Surprise_ and then to this one. I think I promised her 5,000 words at the time and here I am with 108,000 words and a planned third novella in the series as well as some shorter pieces set in the same universe. Sal doing the art for this feels like coming full circle.
> 
> Finally, thank you so much to gblvr, who ran Atlantis Big Bang all by herself this year and was amazingly understanding when I sent her the first rough draft an hour before the deadline. She's a fabulous mod and a wonderful person!
> 
> The title of the story is from the Blue Oyster Cult song "Burning for You." If it had a subtitle, it would be "The Continuing Adventures of Colonel Sadist and His Boy Wonder."

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Giving The Devil His Due covert art and Wallpaper](https://archiveofourown.org/works/120451) by [marlislash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/marlislash/pseuds/marlislash)
  * [Mine](https://archiveofourown.org/works/119128) by [Sal](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sal/pseuds/Sal)




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